Frost Taming Fire
by A Midnights Dream
Summary: Rin had never been a sexual person. But an increase in the frequency and intensity of his urges had him questioning what it was that really satisfied him. Insecure and confused, it would take a very patient and enduring teacher to lead him through choppy waters; a wise blue to match his fiery red. A frost to tame his fire. What did he want, and was this actually love?
1. Simmering embers

**~*Frost Taming Fire*~**

A SosukexRin fanfiction

by **A Midnights Dream**

 ****I didn't make this artwork. I take no credit for this artwork. I tried in earnest to locate the original artist but couldn't. If you are the artist of this work, or know the person. Please message me and I will take it down immediately.**

* * *

Rin's wine colored eyes scanned the labels of the dietary supplements on the shelf, half lidded and similarly half interested.

"What the hell." He grumbled, squinting to try and decipher the jam-packed fine print on the backs of the bottles. "None of this shit is even written in Japanese."

"Of course they aren't." Commented a baritone, sultry voice from beside him. Sosuke had his own fiercely blue eyes trained on the back of a package as well. "All of these products were made in Germany."

Rin made an annoyed sound in the back of his throat. "If they were at least in English I could read them."

He sighed and moved on to the next row of products. He didn't mean to act like a brat. After all, it was his idea to come to the sports shop to look at performance enhancing supplements today. He just didn't have the patience for this sort of thing. Well, for shopping, to be specific. They were also running short on time before practice, making Rin's agitation a bit more pronounced. He hated being rushed.

"Let's look at this stuff from America."

"Okay."

Rin pressed a button on his cell phone to bring up the clock on his screen. God damn it, they would have to leave in the next ten minutes if they were to make it to the bus stop on time and then walk the rest of the way to their school's pool. As captain, he not only had to be at every single practice, but he also had to arrive there early. No one would expect anything less from the captain of the prestigious Samezuka swim team.

He needed to hurry up and pick something. It was a damn trip getting all the way out there to the shopping mall. He rarely had time to step away from the school and come out this way, so he likely wouldn't be able to go back there for a long time. There was no way he was going home empty handed.

"Here, I'll just get this one." Rin said, grabbing one of the products off the shelf.

"Hold on." Sosuke urged. "You really shouldn't just buy stuff like that without reading the back label first. You don't really know what's in it or what side effects it has unless you do."

"It's fine. I'm pretty sure I read an article about this stuff in a sports magazine a while back. It had pretty good reviews, or whatever."

Sosuke raised a dark brow. "Or whatever?"

Rin scowled. "You mocking me?"

"No."

"Well hurry up and get in line. We're gonna miss the bus if we keep dragging our feet like this."

"Fine." Sosuke sighed, but followed after his redheaded friend without any further argument.

* * *

Rin's arms thrashed through the water rhythmically and with purpose. His fingers stabbed through the surface and then were swiftly brought down through the thick of it to propel his body faster and faster through the liquid. He cut through the water like the katana immortalized in his school's symbol, sharp and merciless. He felt nothing but fire burning inside of him as he approached the wall. Instead of feeling fatigued he felt a burst of energy that surged him forward. With one last extension of his arm he slapped his hand on to the cold wet tile with a satisfying _smack_ that resounded through the spacious pool building at Samezuka Academy.

The entire swim team gasped and cheered in amazement.

"Incredible, Rin-Senpai!" Nitori gushed. "That's a new personal best for you!"

"Thanks." Rin huffed through a toothy grin and pulled himself out of the pool. His underclassman continued to praise him but he couldn't make out a word of it as he tousled his fiery locks dry with a towel.

"~'s really no limit to your talent, is there!"

"Well, I wouldn't go that far…" But one thing was for sure. His performance was improving steadily over these past few days. The only thing he'd been doing differently was mixing in some of that dietary powder into his drink about an hour before practice and workouts. He had to admit he was a bit skeptical about the product's effectiveness at first, but he supposed his times were more than enough proof that it worked.

Rin's eyes glanced at the clock on the wall.

"Oi, guys, listen up. Practice is just about over for today…" Rin addressed a few concerns about the upcoming regional tournament, and commented on a few members, where they could improve and what they should be focused on. "...Tomorrow is the weekend, so make sure to get some rest."

"Yes, sir!"

"Alright then, you're dismissed.

* * *

"Hey, I'm going out for a bit."

Rin paused reading his health and fitness magazine for a moment to glance over the pages at his friend Sosuke from the bottom bunk in their dorm room.

"Getting something to eat?"

"Yeah, I'm starving." Sosuke closed the packet of homework he was working on at the desk and stood up from the roll-away chair. He grabbed his Samezuka swim team jacket and headed for the door.

"Fine. See you later. Hey! Grab me something to eat too while you're out." Rin joked and smirked when he got the anticipated terse reply.

"Get it yourself." The door closed with a click, leaving no opportunity for a catty remark from the other party.

Rin waited until he heard his friend's heavy footfalls fade down the hallway and out into the corridor before he picked up his magazine again. His eyes returned to the last line of text he'd been reading and continued on. Rin kept reading, but after a while of laying down and being absolutely alone there came a sensation from his lower body that made it a little difficult for him to concentrate.

"Nnnn...the hell…" Rin grumbled and shifted his hips, seeing if perhaps it was just a random spell of hardness. He went back to the beginning of the paragraph and attempted to read the content again. But instead of that warmth dying away he felt another pulse from his member, pumping it up and making him semi-hard.

"Hnnnn...again with this…" He grumbled and sighed as he stroked himself through his sweatpants. His member twitched in response and grew harder under his hand. Rin got up and locked the door to his dorm room before he went any further. The last thing he needed was Nitori or Momo bursting into his room while he was busy jerking it.

He crawled to the farthest edge of his bed against the wall and sat back against it with his legs splayed out, hanging over the edge of his mattress. Rin closed his eyes and played his fingers over his abs and down beyond to between his legs. He grabbed a bulge that rested below the base of his member and rolled it around in his palm. He felt a flush of warmth go through his loins which made him quiver and his brow furrow upwards. His member strained hard against the soft material of his boxers, demanding freedom and attention. Hooking his fingers under the elastic bands of both his boxers and pants, he pulled them down just enough so that his needy extremity sprung out. It stood high and parallel to his taut abs, stiff and twitching, meekly asking to be tended to.

Rin wrapped his hand around his shaft and started stroking. His heart rate and breathing accelerated from excitement and from that a light blush dusted his cheeks. Behind his eyelids images started flashing that were brought about by his ministrations. They only fueled the growing fire in his loins and accentuated his pleasure. Rin mentally honed in on those images, trying to refine the vague shapes he saw dancing behind his eyelids into clear forms and then from there into erotic fantasy. He tried thinking of rounded hips and generous bosoms. Long hair and wide eyes, soft pillows and folds between two deliciously curvy thighs…

...but he felt nothing from it. His hand continued to stroke but the hot pleasure that had pulsed through his body moments before abandoned him.

 _Why…_

Rin stopped, pausing to clear his mental slate, and started over. Playing with himself, leading into the strokes, calming breaths to take him into those moving pictures...But it was no use. Everytime he tried to escape into an erotic fantasy involving women...it was as if it wasn't satisfying. No part of their bodies that he could imagine could make him hungry, even though he knew that it should.

"Damn it…" He hissed and slumped back on to his mattress, defeated and half hard. "Why the hell does this keep happening? This is like the third time now..."

His foot bumped something off of his bed and it landed on the floor with a soft thump. Rin glanced over and saw his crumpled sports and fitness magazine lying on the floor with its pages open.

"Haaa...what a pain," He muttered and sat up to retrieve it. Once he sat up and could see the image spread out on the pages he froze. It was a male olympic swimmer posed in a playful yet suggestive position on a two-page spread. The photograph of the athlete was shot in such a position that emphasized his lower body: his legs were parted, skin-tight swimsuit clinging to his nether regions. His sun-kissed skin was beaded with water and the snarky grin on his face made his dark eyes seem mischievous...and inviting.

Rin's hand found itself on top of his member again, slowly stroking up and down.

"Aaaah…" He sighed. Looking into the eyes of that man elicited a primal and insatiable desire deep in his core that fanned the simmering embers in his loins to a steady flame.

He kept pumping, thinking of running his tongue across that wet, tanned skin. Fisting his fingers in short dark hair. Feeling a hard and flat body pressed up against his own-

Rin released himself, almost as if in shock, and looked back down upon the smiling picture of the athlete on the floor. Rin's brow furrowed in confusion.

 _What….was...?_

Still reeling from what just happened, Rin pulled up his pants and pretended he didn't feel his rock hard cock knocking against his clothing. With an irritated noise, Rin stood up from his bed, snatched the magazine from the floor and tossed it on to his bed. He snatched a towel out of his bureau and stormed off to the bathroom to go take a cold shower. Again.

* * *

Rin pressed his forehead up against the cold wall of the bathroom shower and tried to let his frustration slip away into the droning sound of the water hitting the tile. The cold water may have drenched the lingering heat between his legs, but it did nothing to calm the heavy bundle of confusion and irritation brooding underneath his wet mop of red hair.

 _I just don't get it…_

Rin reached for his bottle of shampoo and began working it into his blood red roots.

"I'm not a very sexual person…" He muttered to himself, trying to piece things together. "I never was. I can't understand why all of a sudden I have all of these...these _urges_ …It's been like this for about a week..." Then, his breathing caught in his throat and his eyes flew open wide. "Wait a second!"

Barely remembering to put a towel around his waist, Rin burst out of the small bathroom adjoined to his dorm, hair still sudsy with shampoo, and began rummaging through his drawers.

"Where is it? What did I do with it?"

He looked over his shoulder and there it was, sitting undisturbed from where he had left it earlier that afternoon before his workout, almost mocking him in his panicked search.

"Let me see this…" Rin grabbed the bottle of the dietary supplement off the shelf and spun it around to look at the label on the back. His ruby-red orbs shifted, translating the weird English alphabet into words he could understand. "Improved performance...protein...levels of test...wha? testos...tester-ugh, forget it." He kept reading. "Common side effects: rash...headaches...nausea…" His brow furrowed at the last symptom which was oddly set in bold letters. "Increased...sex drive?"

Rin stared at the back of the bottle as he let that information sink in. He reread it again, just to make sure he hadn't misinterpreted or translated incorrectly.

 _Increased sex drive...so...that's the explanation for all of my urges lately?_

He slapped the heel of his hand against his forehead. Of course he should have suspected his powder, why hadn't he sooner? It turned out that apparently Sosuke was good for something. The kid gave good advice every once in a while. It really wasn't like Rin to be so careless or irresponsible about his body or what he put into it. Normally he would have considered all the information on the labels before buying a product. But lately he just had no time...he barely had enough time that day to go to that store with Sosuke. And he was so preoccupied with his swimming, his classes, his grades, his position as captain...he hadn't put two-and-two together until just that moment.

There came a knock from the door.

"Rin." Called the voice from the other side. "It's Sosuke. I'm coming in."

"Uhhh-"

Before Rin could protest or explain himself Sosuke unlocked the door with their dorm key and walked in to the scene of Rin soaking wet in a towel, hair all foamy with shampoo while clutching a bottle of vitamin powder.

Sosuke simply stood in the doorway, hand still on the door knob, and stared at his best friend with rounded eyes.

"...What are you...doing?"

"...Nothing. Just reading the back of the supplement bottle."

"Now? In the middle of your shower?" A corner of Sosuke's mouth pulled up into an amused smirk. He brought the back of his hand up to his mouth as suppressed laughter rumbled in his throat. "Isn't it a bit late for that, anyway? You already bought the damn thing."

"Tch, you don't think I know that?" He put the bottle back on the shelf. "I'm going back to my shower." Rin walked past his friend into the bathroom and resumed his shower like normal.

"Whatever." Sosuke said, still smiling.

* * *

Reading the back of that bottle had solved only one of Rin's problems.

The information on the supplement's label accounted for his increased sexual hunger...but the more pressing problem was...it didn't explain why he was so confused about what he wanted sexually.

Rin's pencil stopped its writing in the middle of his note taking in class as his thoughts drifted off on the subject once again.

 _I'm not a very sexual person..._ He remembered saying, and he stilled agreed with that statement. Before going on this vitamin supplement, Rin barely had urges, and when he did it was usually a fairly simple process of alleviating himself. Rin had always thought of girls when pleasuring himself and it worked for him just fine. Which was why he was so confused that his body was reacting in such a way when he was increasingly horny. He had considered the idea of stopping his intake of the vitamins, but with the valuable increases in his times he didn't feel like it was worth it. He needed to be as fast as he could if he wanted to compete with the swimmers from the other schools. This dietary supplement was a legal food item recognized by the sports administration, so it wasn't as if it was illegal. So while cutting the stuff out of his diet would solve one problem for him, it would only create a more pressing problem for him in the other, more important part of his life. In the mean time Rin's sexual urges and confusion was snowballing inside of him to the point where he felt like a spring under pressure, ready to lunge at someone or anything at the slightest give.

He let his fiery head come to rest in his hand and he rubbed his brow, confused. He just couldn't understand what was happening to him.

Was he...gay?

Could that happen? Could someone suddenly _become_ gay? Just like that? Rin had never really thought about it, but he was pretty sure things didn't work that way...he figured if that was a person's preference, then it would always be that way right from the start. It just didn't make sense to him how all of a sudden he could stop wanting-

"Matsuoka."

"Ha?"

Rin was suddenly pulled back to reality by the voice of his teacher from the front of the classroom. She, as well as a few students from his class, were looking at him expectantly for an answer.

"Oh, uh. I'm sorry. I wasn't paying attention."

A few students snickered and his teacher sighed.

"That's okay, Matsuoka. Could you please read the last paragraph on the bottom of page 36?"

"Yes, of course." And just like that, his personal pondering had to be shelved again, put on the back burner so he could focus on his studies. He stood up from his seat to read the paragraph of English and for the most part everyone turned their eyes back to their books to follow along. Though Rin could still feel one pair of blue eyes resting on his back, and knew all too well who they belonged to.

* * *

The next day found the two best friends at the school's weight room.

It was leg day and Rin was on the leg press machine pumping over a hundred pounds of weight. Sosuke stood by, being ready to take off or add more weight as Rin needed it, but also standing by to give encouragement.

Sweat beaded on Rin's brow and his cheeks flushed a healthy red from increased blood flow. He grit his teeth and grunted as he neared the end of his set.

"Keep going, you almost have it." Sosuke encouraged him.

Rin wasn't sure he could do it. It was beginning to hurt and his body was quivering with the effort of pushing his muscles against the resisting weight.

 _Two more…_ "Ah!" _C'mon Rin, you piece of shit! One more..._ He pushed with all his might against the resistance but could only extend his legs halfway. He struggled for a moment, trying to press forward but he couldn't. With a gasp of air his muscles gave out and the machine's weight plates slammed back to their starting position with a loud _CLANG._ He flopped back into the chair exhausted and out of breath.

"Aaaagh, fuck!" Rin growled, through gasps of air and pulled at his red strands. "God damn it!"

"It's fine," Sosuke urged. "It was close enou-"

"No it wasn't!" Rin snapped, but only felt sorry for it when he saw the look of shock register on his friend's face.

Once he caught his breath, Rin stood up from the machine and without even making eye contact he muttered. "I'm going out behind the gym to flip some tires."

Saying nothing, Sosuke simply let him walk away.

Again, as Rin made his way out of the gym he could feel those piercing blue eyes watching him all the way out.

* * *

Out behind the gym was precisely where Rin wanted to be. It was isolated, there was no one around, and there were tons of rubber tires there for him to beat the shit out of mercilessly.

The hotheaded redhead pulled on his black, fingerless gloves and popped his earbuds into his ears. The heavy, grungy guitar from his music allowed him to tune in to his inner frustration. He grabbed on to it by it's ugly horns and felt the spirit of it fill his muscles with vitality and his heart with vicious endeavors. Setting his sight on his first victim, he moved over to a relatively large tire.

Squatting down, he hooked his fingers under the large grooves of the tire and pulled upwards with all his might. His arm and shoulder muscles bulged as they strained against the activity of lifting something so large. His legs, still weak and hurting from his workout, were at a disadvantage and weren't much help. Slowly, Rin lifted the tire upright with a yell. It stood only for a moment before he shoved it back down viciously with a growl. The thing fell on the ground with a dull but resounding boom.

But doing this wasn't good enough. It was too slow. He needed to rip, tear, beat, pound anything faster to expel all his frustration. Rin saw a smaller, average sized tire and couldn't control himself. Picking it up he whipped it hard against the back wall of the building with a yell where it bounced off and went rolling into the nearby brush bordering the property.

Rin stood there for a moment breathing heavily, feeling the chemicals which had held him captive in irritability and anger slip away from his acts of violence. Rin pulled his ear buds from his ears and ran his fingers through his hair and clenched, holding them there.

His voice was breathless and defeated. "What am I doing…?"

"Oi." Came a voice from behind him, making him spin around. It was Sosuke. How long had he been standing there? Had he seen Rin's childish fit of rage?

"What is it?"

"Don't give me that. You know what. What the hell is wrong with you lately?"

Rin's mouth flattened into a line and he averted his gaze from his best friend.

"There's nothing wrong with me."

"Like hell there isn't."

"I'm _telling you_ there's nothing wrong." Rin growled, getting annoyed.

"Cut the crap, Rin."

Rin's eyes lifted back up to look at his friend. His expression was stoic, and his tone was even as always, but Rin could tell he was getting on Sosuke's nerves blowing him off like this.

"You may be able to lie to yourself, you may be able to fool all the guys on the swim team, but you're not fooling me. Maybe nobody cares or says anything because your times are good and that's all they care about. But I know you better than that to know there's something seriously bothering you."

Rin made an annoyed sound and averted his gaze once more. "Idiot...it's not something I can just talk to you...to _anyone_ about so easily."

"You can talk to me about anything." Sosuke urged, and Rin clenched his fists. He hated not being able to talk to Sosuke, and the god damn idiot wasn't making it any easier for Rin to deal with by being so caring and understanding. "It doesn't matter what it is. I promise I won't laugh at you."

There was a brief spell of silence between them until finally Rin sighed.

"Sosuke...even if I wanted to tell you I...I wouldn't know how the hell to go about explaining it. Even I don't really know…"

"You're not sick, are you?"

"No, that's not it."

"Then an injury?"

"There's nothing wrong with my body, Sosuke. It's not that simple…"

More silence stretched while Rin tried to collect his thoughts.

"Listen...I promise I'll tell you what's going on with me just as soon as I can figure it out myself."

"And just how long is that supposed to take?"

Rin narrowed his wine red orbs at him. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"What I mean is you better not blow this off Rin." For once Sosuke's intensely blue eyes were hooded and serious. "How are we supposed to swim together at regionals if you can't even keep your act together?"

Rin took in a short breath and felt a wave of shame wash over him. Of course Sosuke was worried about more than just him. He was worried about the captain of the Samezuka swim team, the person that was supposed to guide everyone to great achievements. Maybe his _times_ were improving, but if Rin continued to stay frustrated he might lose focus on his other members and where their needs were. Not only that, but Sosuke must have been concerned about the bigger picture, about all of them, Rin and his friends, Nitori and Momo, going to the regional competition and swimming together in the relay. How did he not realize that sooner?

"...Yeah…" Rin clenched his fists. "I know you're right. Just...give me a couple days, okay?"

"Fine. I'm holding you to it. Don't think you're going to get away from me."

"Trust me, I don't."

With that, the taller, darker of the two males stuffed his hands into his pockets and turned away.

"C'mon," He called over his shoulder. "Let's grab a soda and head back."

"Yeah."

* * *

Sure enough, two days came and went and Rin had neither the time nor the want to reflect deeper on the implications of his sexual confusion. How could there be any time for such contemplation between classes, studying, homework, work outs and practice? Even the wee amount of time he had between those things he spent doing mundane tasks such as sleeping or cooking, eating, cleaning, etc.

Rin could certainly use his busy life as an excuse for why he hadn't thought deeper on the subject. But if he were being entirely honest with himself...maybe the reason he didn't want to think about it was because he was afraid of the answers he'd find. Not that the idea of being gay scared or repulsed him. Personally, he didn't care if he was straight, gay or bi (which was something he had considered in the grand scheme of things). He was mostly worried about how the others would receive him.

He knew that these were different times than twenty, or even ten years ago. Being gay now wasn't such a big deal as it was back then but...Rin was also aware of the fact that he was the captain of a swim team where everyone had to be comfortable around each other, everyone had to be comfortable in the locker rooms, in the showers, doing exchanges and getting close together in the pool. And while he was fairly certain that none of his guys would look down on him or reject him for being gay or bisexual...he wasn't so sure that they would be entirely comfortable doing all those things mentioned before with the knowledge of their captain's sexual orientation. And that sort of distraction was something he couldn't allow to happen to his team while they were trying to focus on excelling. It was his responsibility to make sure that his team members shone brightly and succeeded in preserving the prestige of Samezuka Academy.

Rin had reached the time limit he'd asked for to gather his thoughts, and yet he still didn't know how to approach Sosuke about it. There were plenty of times when they were alone together, it was just...a very uncomfortable subject to have to talk about, and with Sosuke, of all people. He didn't know what time would be a good time to talk. But of course, finally, Sosuke decided for them one evening when they were sitting together in the silence of the dorm room, each doing their own homework assignments. Rin sat on his bottom bunk with his nose in a textbook and Sosuke over by the desk in a similar predicament. All had been silent between the two males for a good two hours, when suddenly Sosuke closed his book and stood up.

"C'mon, let's take a break and go for a run."

Rin's eyes flicked over to the alarm clock beside their bunk beds and saw that the time was 9:03 p.m. It was kind of late for a run. Sosuke usually didn't like staying out late if they had stuff to do the following morning. But...Rin had a vague idea why he was asking to take a break. He knew that Sosuke didn't really want to go out for a run. He wanted to get Rin alone, and talk. His best friend may have been in the top ten in the country for swimming butterfly, but the kid was as transparent as a pane of glass sometimes.

"Yeah, sure." Closing his book, the two males slipped into their running clothes and headed out into the dusk.

* * *

The night was brisk and a bit windy. But those were the best possible conditions a runner could ask for when going out for exercise. The wind tousled Rin's hair, keeping his bangs from getting in his eyes, and kept his brow free from perspiration. Tonight it was Sosuke who took the lead in running. Every so often they would switch it up and let the other choose where they ran to and for how long. But just knowing the nature of why Sosuke wanted to go out running in the first place, Rin keenly suggested that Sosuke lead them to where they should go.

The two males were mostly silent on their run. Sosuke in front and Rin following behind, both absorbed with their music playing and the rush of adrenaline that came with exercise. Sosuke lead them through the suburban neighborhood surrounding their school's property and then down a long stretch of highway that was flanked by office buildings on one side and the ocean on the other. The road was like the dividing line between untamed nature and confined society. The road took them straight into downtown, and from there Sosuke steered into the central park.

"Oi," Sosuke called, breathless with beads of perspiration around his dark brow. "Let's take a rest here for a sec and stretch."

"Yeah." Rin agreed. This run had actually been a bit long for him but he hadn't said anything about it. Breathless and faintly clinging with the musky scent of their sweat, the two males stretched their limbs and core muscles that were all fired up with blood.

Sosuke rolled his shoulder muscle around in its socket and grimaced when the action brought about a few pops. Without saying anything, he went over to a vending machine that wasn't too far away and put in enough change for one bottle of water and one can of cola.

"Here." He said, tossing Rin the bottle of sweating water.

"Ah, thanks." He murmured, feeling a bit surprised. It wasn't like Sosuke to buy shit for him. Did he perhaps feel sorry for what he was about to do to Rin?

Both of them took a seat on a nearby bench and finished catching their breaths. The only noise that went between them was their mingled breathing and the leaves scratching against each other in the gentle breeze.

"Okay then, start talking."

Rin's grip tightened around his water bottle as he felt a sinking feeling in his gut. He knew it was coming and yet he still wasn't prepared for it.

"Go on, you've had plenty of time to think about it." The taller of the two males tipped his head back and took a big gulp of his soda, giving Rin the opening he needed to begin.

"Idiot." Rin murmured. "I never had any intention of running away. You didn't have to drag me all the way out here." Rin's futile attempt to redirect the subject was thwarted as Sosuke remained quiet and had his intense blue eyes fixed on Rin, pinning him in place until he provided Sosuke with the answers he wanted to hear.

 _Fine_ , Rin thought. _There's obviously no shaking him_ … "I…" He began, but his words fell flat. He had no idea how he'd possibly begin this. He certainly wasn't going to begin by admitting his failure to take Sosuke's advice about reading the back of the vitamin bottle before buying it.

 _You know what? Screw it_ , enough with trying to figure out the preamble to his explanation. This was the sort of thing that was awkward no matter how you said it, Rin realized, so he figured he might as well just get out with it.

"I'm not sure about what I want any more, Sosuke…" Rin saw his friend's brow furrow. Sosuke opened his mouth to say something, but Rin anticipated his question and spoke up before he could get a word out. "And I don't mean about my future or what I want to do with my swimming. That hasn't changed. I…" His fingers clenched tighter around the plastic of the bottle and he felt his gut raising up in his throat. "I mean...I don't know what I want any more… _Sexually..._ "

The silence that followed after Rin's statement was nearly deafening. There was no wind or gentle breathing to fill in the chasm that now stood between them. Anything that Sosuke might have thought Rin was going to talk about had probably been blown out of the water. Steeling his nerves, Rin glanced over at his friend and found an expression of mild shock on his handsome features: Blue eyes rounded, dark brows raised and mouth popped open slightly.

Now that had finally managed to get the base of it out in the open, the rest of his words started coming easier.

"I've been so sexually frustrated lately. I don't know what to make of it. Recently I've been having way more urges and feelings than I normally do, but when I go to…you know," Rin blushed and just made a motion in the air, too mortified to actually say the words to his lifelong rival.

"I can't even stay hard! It's like, I try to think about the things that used to get me off before and I...It just doesn't..." Rin ran his fingers through his hair and pulled at the strands in frustration. Just talking about the subject had him all riled up, and it didn't help his stress levels to talk about his problems to the one person who was close to him and the one person who he still actually gave a shit what he thought about him.

"I can't tell if this is just a phase or if...or if I might have indirectly found something out about myself...I'm not sure about myself any more…"

There. That was it. That was all he had to say, minus the increased sex drive part from the dietary supplement, but he wasn't about to give Sosuke credit and inflate his ego.

Rin refused to look up from the pavement, afraid of what he might see on his friend's face. Rejection, disgust, or even fear. But all he heard Sosuke utter was

"Oh…"

The two sat in silence for a few more tense moments. The longer it went on the harder it was for Rin to break it. Just as he was about to open his mouth and say something, Sosuke said that last words on earth he'd expected to hear.

"I know how you feel."

Anything that Rin had been about to say died in his throat and questions exploded in his mind. He snapped his head up to look at his teammate but Sosuke was no longer looking at him. He had his regular neutral expression fixed on his face and was staring out into the dark deserted park.

"What do you mean?" Came Rin's soft reply, and then he felt his resentment flare, tempering the edge in his words. "How could you know how I'm feeling?"

"I know because I've been through it before myself."

It was Rin's turn to have his features work through an expression of shock. What? Sosuke had battled with this exact same problem before?

"It was before I came to Samezuka Academy," The brunette continued. "My second year of high school, right before I transfered. In the middle of that year I went through the same slew of problems and questions. What did I like? Was it okay to like those things? How did I feel about it? But the most important of those questions to me was what did I like?" A breeze rolled through the park and played with both of the boys hair and kicked up a few fallen leaves on the ground, stirring them up into a small mini-tempest. "It wasn't easy, and the answers didn't come to me right away, but eventually I did figure out what I wanted and came to terms with it."

Rin was silent, unable to ask the question that hung so heavy like an anvil over their heads.

"I found out I'm bisexaul."

The words hit Rin like a blow to the chest. The news knocked the wind out of him. To say he was utterly surprised was an understatement. Here he was thinking he knew everything there was to know about Sosuke Yamazaki, his best friend for more than half his life, who told him everything and could talk to him about anything.

"You're bisexual?" Rin reiterated. "And you never told me?"

Sosuke looked at his friend side long. "Does it matter to you that I am?"

The question caught Rin off guard, making him blink. "Of course it doesn't! But isn't that the sort of thing you would tell somebody?"

Sosuke shrugged. "It never came up in conversation and you never asked. It didn't really seem like anything that was important to us being friends or working together on the swim team. So I didn't say anything about it."

Rin growled and smacked the palm of his hand against his forehead. "Idiot...how the hell could I have not noticed it?" He took a breath and shoved his hands into his pockets. "I guess I shouldn't be so surprised though. You're so laid back about everything, I should have figured that a stupid thing like gender wouldn't matter to you when it comes to sex." Rin shook his head, still reeling from the information. How could he have been living with Sosuke for so long and never even thought to ask…

"Well, whatever. Enough about that." Sosuke continued. "We're not here to talk about me. We came out here to talk about you."

"Oh, uh...yeah."

"So...what's up?"

Rin growled, feeling the light flush of embarrassment returning to his cheeks. He scratched the back of his neck, feeling awkward and looked away. "Do I have to spell everything out for you?"

"Not everything. But if you tell me what you're struggling with I can help you better."

"Alright…" Rin sighed, reluctant. "I guess you have a point." He started from the very beginning and told Sosuke everything. Even his discovery about reading the back of the dietary supplement bottle. Surprisingly though Sosuke didn't smirk and rub the information in Rin's face like he anticipated. To the brunette's credit, he listened very patiently and kept his face open, free from judgment or laughter-even when Rin was struggling to tell him intimate parts of his problem, which was hard enough for him to say just in general, let alone to Sosuke.

"And that's everything that's happened so far."

Sosuke had been listening intently with is fingers poised on his chin in thought. "I see…"

"Yeah."

"Listen, Rin." Sosuke turned in his seat to fully face his friend and locked their gazes together. "If I can, I'd like to save you a world of trouble by trying to figure this out all on your own…" His gorgeous blue eyes dropped down to his hands which had been resting in his lap. His fingers curled into fists. "I wish I had had someone there for me when I was struggling with this."

"Sosuke…" Rin murmured, noticing the look of pain that ran across those steely blue orbs.

The lonesome athlete stood up then, not wanting to make eye contact at the moment, with his hands stuffed in his pockets looking away. Another breeze rolled by and pulled at Sosuke's clothes, but the broad brunette had his mind on other things and didn't even notice. Rin wondered...Just what exactly did Sosuke go through during the time that they had spent apart? Rin realized that he had matured physically, that much was glaringly obvious. But for the first time he was realizing that the Sosuke he knew back in elementary school and the Sosuke he was now where very different people, even if on the surface they seemed basically the same.

"All I'm saying is that if you need advice or need someone to talk to, you can come to me anytime." Cerulean irises slid in their sockets to connect with ruby. "You know that right?"

 _Sosuke..._ Rin felt his lower lip quiver and felt wetness forming on the corners of his eyes. He dipped his head so his friend wouldn't see his emotions getting the better of him. The last thing he needed after Sosuke had been so nice to him was to sour the mood by giving the brunette an opportunity to tease him.

Rin picked up his head and returned his friend's gaze with a steady stare. "I do."

"Good. Alright then. That's good for now." He tipped his head back and finished the remaining soda that he had. His massive hand crumpled the can and then tossed it into the recycling bin. "Let's head back."

"Okay."

The two began jogging again back towards town, one following behind the other, as if nothing had ever happened.

"By the way," Sosuke huffed, casting his glance over his shoulder. "I've got some stuff you can try, if you want."

"Uhhh…." Rin's brow furrowed. "What does...what _stuff_ are you talking about?"

"You know, magazines, DvDs, stuff like that. I could let you borrow them just to see what you think."

"Wwwwhhhaaat?" Rin nearly stopped running. "You mean you _have_ stuff like that!?"

"Yeah. Doesn't everybody?"

Rin never bought stuff like that. But he supposed that just came down to differences in sex drives. Before taking that supplement, Rin was never that interested enough in anything sexually to want to get his hands on stuff like that. But since they were trying to experiment and see what he liked he supposed he wouldn't be entirely reluctant to the idea. He was gonna have to get used to stuff like this if he was going to have Sosuke be his mentor...that felt really weird to say.

* * *

 **Well helloooooo dearies! Oh my gosh, how long has it been since I've written** _ **aaaand**_ **posted something? Literally years, I think. It's crazy how much time work and university takes up. But even besides that, I haven't really been motivated to write any sort of fanfiction all that time because I haven't been in to anything. But that kind of goes hand-in-hand with me not having time to get into anything either. When I'm in school I'm like super, radical religious about doing my homework, studying and staying focused. I know that if I start a new show/game/book while I'm in school, I'm gonna get so wrapped up in the characters and the story that it's only going to distract me from my studies, so I make it a point to abstain from all those things when I'm in school. (yeah, it sucks pretty hard. I pretty much only get to watch anime and write fanfictions and stuff like that during the summer :[ )**

 **That being said, I literally JUST finished watching Free! - Eternal Summer the other day and all I can say is...Ishiprinandsosukesogoddamnhardomfg! I have NEVER shipped a pairing so hard in all of my days. For the first time in a long time I felt this overwhelming desire to write a fanfic for two characters. But I want to do something different with this story as opposed to my other rated-M fics and focus more on the love aspect of it and have the sexy part of it come second. There will be sexies, to be sure, don't you worry your pretty little head about that. But I just want this to be more of a** _ **love**_ **story, you know?**

 **I'm sorry the first chapter didn't really have anything exciting or juicy in it. But Rin and Sosuke are going to take things slow, and find out that they like each other so just be patient and watch their feelings for each other flower into a beautiful blossom. Is that gay? Did that sound gay? Good! I wanted it to! Keep reading and I'll keep posting =) until next time, see you later, dearies!**


	2. A Burning Realization

**Chapter Two**

 ***~A Burning Realization~***

* * *

Rin stood in the check-out line at the grocery store listening to each item he'd selected ring up with a _beep...beep…beep._ Hands in his pockets, his ruby red eyes stared off into space, unable to withstand the sheer mundaneness of the situation.

"Your total is ¥5000, please." Said a small voice from the register, pulling Rin back down to earth. His gaze connected with wide and bright blue eyes framed nicely with thick lashes. The head that they belonged to was done up pretty with curls and light makeup, just the way he liked it.

The cashier looked at him, surprised, as if she hadn't expected to see someone so young, so attractive, and with such charming red hair come into her store.

She bit her bottom lip and her slender fingers began to toy with her blonde curls.

"Will that be debit or credit?" Her voice was breathless and suggestive.

Rin felt heat kindling in his nether regions. Rin couldn't say for sure what it was, but he felt this tension between their gazes. It was like their bodies were being drawn together, like magnets, and it was only a matter of time before they connected.

"Uh...Cash is all I have." He replied flatly.

The two stood staring at each other for a few tense moments, like two animals in a standoff about to lunge at each other's throats.

Then, without warning, the cashier reached over the counter, grabbed Rin by the collar of his shirt, and forced her mouth down over his.

His ruby-red eyes flew open wide, and his first instinct was to pull away, but she was impossibly strong for such a tiny thing. He couldn't break free! Meanwhile the heat simmering between his legs only grew more intense. He didn't want to be doing something like this with a complete stranger in a public place but...somehow his body was gravitating in the opposite direction of what he knew was right.

With her impossible strength the cashier lifted him clear off the floor and slammed him down on top of the conveyer belt, the other person's groceries be damned. She was on top of him in an instant, pressing her body up against his and grinding on the half hard lump between his legs.

"Uuuuuhnn...Rin, I want you so bad…" She moaned into his mouth.

The other customers looked on completely horrified. Rin looked over and swore he could have seen familiar faces swimming in the crowd, all looking at him with disgust.

" _Can you believe this?"_

" _Doing something like that in a place like this! It's disgraceful!"_

" _Someone should call the police!"_

Rin felt a twinge of fear from that last statement, but didn't really care enough to do something about the predicament he was in. After all, maybe he'd finally be able to get some release…

When he turned his gaze back to the front, the petite blond cashier that had body-slammed him down on to the belt was gone, and instead it was the dark haired athlete he recognized from his sports magazine, shirtless and lightly sprayed with water.

He glared down at Rin with those hooded, mischievous eyes and his sexy mouth pulled into a smirk. Without saying anything he nuzzled his face into the crook of Rin's neck and feathered his skin with kisses.

"W-wait!" Rin cried, feeling his entire face heat up. "What're...you…" The redhead felt all the breath leave his body as the man on top of him continued his ministrations on his neck. His lips, his teeth, his hot tongue all dancing on Rin's skin, toying with his nerves. The cashier from before had managed to kindle the heat between his legs, but that was nothing compared to the roaring fire that consumed his whole body now, reaching all the way up to the tops of his ears, simply from this man kissing a single spot on his body.

"Aaahn...s...stop…" Rin's fingers weakly dug into the other man's skin, trying to deter his antics but instead it turned into a reflex from being so excited.

"Stop what you're doing right now!" A voice boomed, completely pulling Rin out of the hazy pleasure. He and the person on top of him were surrounded by police officers and one very upset looking front-end manager.

"What in god's name do you think you're doing?! And in my store, to one of my employees, no less!" He boomed, his face growing redder by the moment.

"Wait! You don't understand!" Rin tried to explain. "I didn't do anything! It was-" But when he turned his attention back to the front the tables had completely turned. Instead of him being underneath he was on top, and the male athlete that had been pleasuring him had transformed back into the female cashier. She had her clothes all messed up and tears welled up in her eyes. Rin understood how the situation probably looked to the others and knew instantly that trying to explain anything away was fruitless.

The next thing Rin knew people were pulling him off the conveyer belt and through the store. The last thing he saw before he was roughly thrown into a dark and cold cell was the chilling smile on the cashier's face. Before he could even get a handle on what was happening to him or where he was an iron-barred door slammed and locked into place.

"Wait!" He screamed and got up to pull at the bars. "What's going on! Get back here!"

His eyes suddenly found a shape that was standing apart from the gloom further away in the room. It looked like a man, garbed in a police uniform, with his back facing towards Rin. Something glinted and jingled. The officer had a ring of keys that he was twirling around his index finger.

"Hey!" Rin called out, but the man didn't seem to hear him. "I SAID HEY!" He screamed, voice bouncing off the bare, dank walls. "Would someone listen to me, please?"

The officer, seeming to have finally heard Rin, turned to look at him over his shoulder. His clear cerulean eyes cut through the gloom like sharp icicles.

"S...Sosuke?"

* * *

Rin awoke with a choking sound and bolted upright so fast he accidentally slammed his forehead into the underside of the top bunk, adding a stab of pain (and shortly after anger) to his panic.

"Aaaah, _shit_!" He hissed, clutching his face. "Son of uh-! What the hell!"

From up above him Rin could hear shifting sounds and clamped his mouth shut, forgetting that Sosuke was asleep in the top bunk. Rin kept his breathing shallow as he tried to calm down and get a grip on reality.

The dream had started off so realistic...he hadn't even noticed he had drifted off to sleep. It had all seemed too real. But he relaxed by reminding himself that none of it happened, it was just a dream. He wasn't in jail as a registered sex offender or a rapist or whatever title was equivalent to his worst nightmare.

Something knocking on the front of his boxers distracted him from his dying waves of panic.

"For crying out loud…" Rin whispered, feeling himself through his underwear to find that he was hard. Not even in his dreams could he escape from his problems, or find any release. Too late to take a shower or go for a run, and also too early to get up and start getting ready for school, Rin flopped back against his mattress with a growl and tried to ignore the roaring fire of want emanating from between his legs.

* * *

"What's up with that gash on your forehead?"

Rin froze midway from bringing a bite of food to his mouth to glare at Sosuke.

"Tch...Shut up." Rin rubbed at the red bump on his forehead self-consciously.

The bigger of the two males spent a moment looking at his roommate with a concerned expression but then sighed and went back to eating his own breakfast.

The roaring din in their Academy's cafeteria filled the silence that stretched between them.

"By the way," Sosuke continued, nonchalantly eating his rice. "I went home this past weekend and grabbed those things for you like I said I would."

Rin arched his brow. "Things? What are you talking about?"

"Here, I'll just give it to you."

"Gah! Wait, you idiot!" Rin scrambled, grabbing on to Sosuke's hand as he reached for his school bag. "Not here!"

"Why? What's the problem?" Sosuke's brow furrowed. "This is an all-guys school. I'm pretty sure they've seen porn before."

"Would you think for a minute? I don't _care_ if they've seen it before or not, I don't want-"

"Morning guys!" Came a chipper voice from the other side of their table.

Another fiery redhead, his color even more intense than that of Rin's, stood before the two males with a tray filled with breakfast and an infectious smile on his face.

"Ah, Momo." Sosuke murmured like he and his best friend weren't locked in mortal combat. "Morning."

The underclassman tilted his head to the side, his golden eyes curious. "What are you guys doing?"

Rin realized how weird things must have looked with him leaned across the table clutching Sosuke's wrist in a death grip. Momo's eyes flicked to Sosuke's bag and Rin released his arm as if Sosuke's skin had suddenly turned to ice, hoping Momo wouldn't make the connection.

"We weren't doing anything. Sosuke was just being a smart ass."

Cerulean blue eyes narrowed to icy slivers as they connected with red.

"Hnnnnn? Well, whatever. Move over so I can sit with you guys."

"I'll give it you later tonight after practice." Sosuke said, once Momo got settled.

Rin shot his best friend a warning glare, making sure he didn't go any further in front of company.

"Fine." His tone was final, effectively shelving the conversation for later.

"Huh? Give him what?"

"It's nothing." Sosuke went back to shoving pieces of food in his mouth.

"Give him what? Hey c'mon guys! Don't leave me in the dark like this!"

* * *

"Well, here you go."

Sosuke had laid out the various... _items_ he'd brought for Rin on their desk. They were mostly just magazines, though. There were four of them, to be exact, and they ran the gamut from women, women _and_ men, to just men and all four of them had varying levels of nudity. Just looking at the cover images had the tips of Rin's ears and his cheeks burning red.

There were a couple of DvDs, one looked like a simple hetero flick while the other one featured two guys on the cover.

"I…" Rin had trouble finding his words. "It's...still kind of hard to believe that you own stuff like this…" He blushed, scratching the back of his head and looking anywhere but at Sosuke.

"Alright. I'm leaving now."

"You're leaving? Where are you going?"

Sosuke shrugged his jacket on and reached for his shoes. "I'm not sticking around for this."

"You idiot!" Rin shouted, throwing one of his shoes at his back. "I'm not going to watch this stuff right _now!_ "

"Why not?"

"Well-!" Rin's vehemence rose up out of his core but fell flat against the back of his teeth. He realized that he really didn't have a good reason to not look at this stuff right now. It wasn't that late, they had already finished their assignments, and practice had ended about an hour ago. He supposed that if he were honest...it just embarrassed the hell out of him to look at stuff like that!

"I'm going to the cafe to get dinner. Then I'm going for a walk. I'll text you."

"Ah, wait a-!" But before he could argue any further Sosuke shut the door and proceeded down the hallway.

Rin sighed, defeated, and glanced over at the glossy pages on the desk. He averted his gaze, blushing, but shook it off.

"Get it together, Rin." He growled. "What are you, some kind of coward?" With a trembling hand he reached for the magazine that was closest to him and opened a new chapter on his journey for sexual identity.

* * *

A couple hours came and went, and only one of the magazines could be found slightly upset from its original position on the desk. Across the room a miserable lump lay on the bottom bunk in absolute darkness, completely wrapped up in the comforter with red eyes glaring behind his lids.

The door to their dorm room opened again around 10:30 p.m. The bright light from the hallway cut through the solid darkness that Rin was festering in, but he was careful not to move. Rin pretended to be asleep when he heard Sosuke talking to him, asking if he was still awake. He kept his lips pursed together and prayed that Sosuke wouldn't pester him for an answer. After a couple attempts earned no response, the solemn butterfly swimmer gave up and quietly started getting ready for bed. Within minutes, he climbed up into his own bunk and got settled.

Rin finally opened his eyes to the darkness and felt tears of frustration pool at the corners of his lashes. He fisted his fingers in the material of his blankets and bit back a slew of curses that boiled up inside him.

* * *

A few days later found Rin Matsuoka sitting on the floor of his dorm room with his back propped up against his bottom bunk bed, red orbs trained on the tv screen.

"Aah, c'mon…" He growled, slamming his thumbs down into the video game controller's buttons, as if the simple physical task would assure his victory. "The hell…"

Rin heard the door open just as he died once more, causing his anger to become even more pronounced.

"Oi," called the deep, sultry voice from over near the door. "What have you been doing this whole time?"

"Tch...trying to get through this screen, what do you think?"

There was a slight pause.

"Have you even taken a look at the things I left for you?" Rin could hear the irritation in Sosuke's voice but was in no mood to deal with his shit at the moment.

"No, I haven't, okay? Would you get off my case about it?"

The light flicked on overhead and heavy footsteps approached him from behind. Sosuke walked in between Rin and the TV screen, arms folded and a scowl fixed on his handsome face. The guy was so tall his shadow completely eclipsed the redhead on the ground.

"Hey-!"

"When are you gonna stop goofing off and take this seriously, Rin?" Sosuke's beautiful cerulean eyes looked hooded and dark, like ocean waves about to turn violent from a storm. "I don't step out at this time every night for my own health. It's so you can take a look at the stuff I left for you."

"I am taking this seriously-" Rin growled, but his best friend wasn't done berating him yet.

"Could have fooled me. It doesn't even look like you've touched them. And every night when I get back there's an excuse for you not talk to me about it." It really wasn't like Sosuke to get so upset, but now the brunette was actually raising his voice. "You told me you weren't gonna blow this off, so what the hell-"

"I told you," Rin growled, abandoning his controler to stand up on Sosuke's level to return his glare. "I'm not _blowing this off_."

"Then what the hell _are_ you doing, Rin?"

The corners of Rin's scowl deepened as the two males stood glaring at each other, the air around them electrified by their intensity. Rin let out a sigh that sounded like a growl and pressed the power button to his console with his foot, turning the device off.

Rin took a seat at the edge of his bunk bed and kept his red eyes trained on the ground. "I'm telling you that I _have_ been trying, even though it doesn't seem like it." His fingers knitted together out of nervousness and his elbows rested on his knees. "The reason I haven't told you about any of it is the same reason as before...It's...It's just not something that I can talk about so easily. Maybe it's different for you, but-"

"Well, we're talking now." Sosuke shifted so that he leaned back against the desk, arms folded over his broad chest. "So out with it. What's up?"

"Haaaaa…." _Jesus Christ_ , Rin cursed inwardly, running his fingers through his hair. _This guy doesn't fucking quit, does he_?

"Look...I've tried all those things you left for me and I just...I don't like them, alright?"

There was a brief silence that stretched between them.

"You didn't like any of them?" Rin could hear the incredulousness in Sosuke's voice which only made the tightening feeling in his gut get worse.

"Yeah."

"Hhhm…" Sosuke said, scratching the back of his neck. "Well that's...odd."

More silence. Rin dug his fingernails into the wood of the bunk bed.

"It's not for the reasons that you think, though. It's not like I'm completely uninterested in any of the things they have in there. It's just…" Rin brought up one of his hands and looked at the blank surface of his palm. "I felt so disgusting every time I touched myself."

The words came out and the stifling embarrassment followed after. Rin felt his cheeks sting and felt too mortified to explain anything further.

"Why?" Sosuke asked, apparently oblivious to Rin's internal struggle. Or maybe the sadistic bastard was plainly aware, Rin thought, and was deadset on getting answers out of him regardless of how uncomfortable it made him. "What do you mean?"

"I…" giving up trying to use his words, Rin stood up suddenly and snatched one of the pornographic mags off the desk. He flipped open to a random page and held it up beside him for Sosuke to see. He didn't dare look at the image there, though, for fear of his entire face burning bright red.

"Do you really expect me to get excited and beat off to a bunch of pictures of men and women who clearly aren't wanting it? They may be posed with their legs all spread and whatever but I know it's not because they want it. They're just doing it for money; they're only hard because they swallowed a pill. They don't really want any of it. It's all so fake...their eyes look so hollow…"

Sosuke's dark brows furrowed upwards with concern. "Rin…"

Undeterred now, Rin continued. "Pleasuring myself while thinking of that... makes me feel disgusting and cheap." He let his arm come to rest beside him, the pages of the magazine half closed. "Maybe most guys can just close their eyes and pretend that those actresses are entirely into it and just wanna get fucked...But I'm not like that."

Rin handed the magazine back to Sosuke who took it, but still had his intense blue eyes locked on to his redheaded friend.

Rin averted his gaze and felt shame wash over him. "I'm sorry for not telling you sooner…"

The boys stood in silence for a while again, before Sosuke spoke up.

"It's alright." He said, bringing the redhead's attention back to the front. "Nobody said that you had to like them. To be honest with you, I'm not all that into them either. I only held on to them from my earlier days of trying to figure stuff out. I just hadn't gotten around to throwing them away with how busy I've been."

Rin raised one of his brows, not sure if Sosuke's story seemed credible or not.

"Listen, don't worry about this." Sosuke scooped up the magazines and DvDs and placed them back in his backpack. "I'll think of something else."

"Actually, Sosuke...maybe-"

"Quit your complaining." Sosuke's words were harsh, but his smile was warm. "I said I would help you, didn't I?"

"Yeah…but..."

"Just let me worry about it, alright?"

Sosuke held up his fist, waiting for his friend to return their nearly life-long gesture.

Rin couldn't help the feeling of endearment that welled up inside him as he brought his fist up too and lightly bumped it against Sosuke's

"Okay."

* * *

"A costume party?"

Rin's voice was nearly drowned out by all of the noises in the Samezuka pool room. All the splashing and yelling was enough to nearly mute him out.

"Yeah. One of my friends from my old high school is having it. She said I could bring friends if I want."

"Eeeh, I don't really know…" Rin's sentence drifted off as his wine colored eyes watched one of his members making his turn against the wall. "Onodera! Put some backbone into your kick!"

"What would be the problem? They're kids from a different school, so it's not like anyone is going to know who you are. Plus, you'll be wearing a costume, so..."

"I just don't see how going to a costume party is supposed to help me figure out what I want-Takano! You won't make the time if you keep flopping your arms like that!"

Rin sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. "Is there any way we can talk about this later?"

"Not really. It's tomorrow night."

"Tomorrow night? How long have you known about this?"

"Not that long." Sosuke shrugged. "I didn't have any intention of going until I thought of you."

Rin bit his lower lip in thought and his red orbs scanned the water. He shook his head then. "I still don't understand how that's supposed to help me."

"You were telling me that you couldn't get into the magazines and stuff like that because the people on the pages weren't truly interested, right? Is that basically the jist of it?"

Rin pouted and shifted his gaze, wary if there were others within earshot of their conversation.

"Yeah, I guess so…"

"I figured if we go to this party then that would allow you to interact with live people. People who aren't being bribed with money or forced to swallow a pill to make them attracted to you. Understand?"

Rin's ruby-red eyes started looking at his members, looking for an excuse to quit the conversation. But for once everyone was on their marks and being focused. Rin felt the same way now as he did that first night Sosuke wanted him to read those magazines: he absolutely had no good excuse to refuse this offer, and he certainly wasn't in a position to flat-out refuse after Sosuke had been so thoughtful as to think of him, but at the same time...going out to a party and flirting with people wasn't something Rin did very often. Though he did have to admit the idea kind of tempted him. It...sounded like it might be fun.

"You don't have to go if you don't want to." Sosuke said. "I'm just saying it's an idea."

"Yeah, I know…" Rin's heel tapped against the cool tile as he mulled over the idea. "Even if we _were_ gonna to go to this party, where the hell would we get costumes on such short notice?"

* * *

"You almost done?"

"Ah, yeah, sorry."

The sound of a curtain sliding across a rack filled the small studio room as Rin unveiled himself fully dressed in costume.

"Ah! You look so cool, Matsuoka!" One of the theater club members gushed.

"Yeah!" Chirped another. "I almost mistook you for a _real_ police officer."

"That's not really such a good thing though, is it?" Rin asked, scratching the back of his neck.

Rin looked for cerulean-blue eyes among the crowd and found them in his best friend Sosuke, standing opposite of him, arms folded over his chest which was adorned in a police uniform identical to the one he was wearing.

"Anyways, we really appreciate you guys letting us borrow these for tonight. Are you sure it's okay?"

"It ain't no thang!" The theater club's president beamed. "Our next play is Romeo and Juliet, so we don't have a need for any of our modern-looking costumes right now anyways."

Rin wasn't going to comment on the fact that Samezuka Academy was an all boy's school and that some poor sap had to play the part of Juliet.

"But isn't it against the rules to be lending out your costumes like this?" Rin asked. "You guys aren't going to get in trouble, are you?"

"Nope!" The president flashed him a thumbs up. "Just be sure you tell people how awesome the theater club is, alright?"

"Yeah, we'll be sure to do that." Sosuke said, stepping forward through the small gathering to stand in front of his roommate. His blue orbs scanned over Rin's person, making sure he had all the right things in the proper places, Rin supposed.

Rin looked at the two of them standing side by side in the mirror and couldn't help but let a toothy grin grace his face.

"We look totally bad ass." Rin smirked, holding up his fist to Sosuke.

His friend matched Rin's grin with one of his own and gently bumped his fist together with Rin's. "Damn right, we do."

"Just be sure to leave the costumes outside of the club room in the roll-away laundry cart tomorrow. Oh! I almost forgot!" One of the club members ran into the closet for a quick moment and came back holding a police cap. "We have a cap for one of the uniforms! But we don't really know what happened to the other one though, so only one of you can use it."

"M-maybe you guys can take turns!"

"Hell no." Rin smirked, all fired up. "Only one way to settle this."

"I couldn't agree more," Sosuke returned his friend's smirk and got into position.

"One...two...three!"

* * *

"I didn't want it anyways." Sosuke grumbled. "You can stop gloating about it now."

Rin whistled and strutted down the street with his thumbs hooked in his pockets and his legs swinging wide, just like an officer on patrol. The police cap sat proudly on top of his fiery head.

"Who's gloating?" He asked and flashed his friend a snarky grin.

Sosuke only sighed, defeated. "Whatever."

"Where is this party anyway?" Not for the first time, Rin surveyed the area they were in and wondered where the hell they were going. They had left the condensely packed apartments of a residential area quite a while ago and had apparently entered some kind of warehouse district.

"Hhmn…" Sosuke scratched the back of his neck. "That's...a good question."

"Tch, you can't be serious." Rin sighed. "You didn't even bother to get directions to the party you were invited to?"

"I did, it's just," Sosuke's eyes shifted over the bare backs of the warehouses. "Everything here looks the same."

The area they were in had narrow roads that snaked through buildings only a few stories high. Nearly all of them had absolutely no windows and only some of them had the occasional sketchy-looking door. There were no other types of buildings, houses or stores to break up the scenery. It was around 9:30 at night, meaning it was dark. The orangey glow of the street lights were spaced _just_ close enough together to provide sufficient lighting for night-time travel. But occasionally the gaps between them were a bit too far apart, leaving some stretches of their walks in almost complete darkness.

Rin sighed once more. "Well, I guess I shouldn't be surprised, this coming from you. You always were terrible with directions."

Sosuke removed his dorm key from his pocket and began twirling the keychain loop it was attached to around his finger. "Don't worry, we'll get there sooner or later."

"Idiot, that's not…" Rin's eyes fixated on the key twirling around the tip of Sosuke's finger, the metal glinting as they walked under another street light. Rin's brow furrowed and felt the back of his neck prickle from a creeping sense of Deja Vu.

Sosuke looked over at Rin as the redhead's sentence trailed off. "What? Why are you staring at me?"

Rin snapped back to reality and shook his head.

"I was...It's nothing."

As they took another corner Rin could finally start to hear the booming bass of music. For the first time in their nearly half hour trip he felt some sort of assurance that they were headed in the right direction.

A few more minutes found both of the two males in front of a fully decked-out warehouse. It had its big bay doors open, through which crowds of people and flashing colorful lights could be seen. The music pulsed out of the opening in waves, beckoning the two males to come inside and partake in the festivities like tidal waves pulling their bodies into the surf.

Groups of young people in all sorts of elaborate and colorful costumes stood outside of the gate in clusters, laughing, shrieking, holding red plastic cups and fully adorned in glow-stick bracelets and necklaces.

Rin reflexively felt his stomach sink with nervousness and took a small step closer to his friend.

Sosuke, perceptive as ever, noticed Rin's slight shift and glanced at him. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong. I just…" Rin stuffed his hands in his pockets, unsure of what to do with them or where to look. "Uh...you lead the way."

"Alright, this way." Seemingly unaffected by the rowdy atmosphere, Sosuke headed straight towards the thrashing throng of people. Beside the big front door there stood a cute, petite girl with short, bright pink hair behind a booth. Her small frame was garbed in a heavenly angel costume. Though this particular angel didn't look so holy and chaste. The hemlines to her sparkling white dress were daring and the back of the dress exposed the pale expanse of her skin. Two fluffy white wings protruded from her shoulder blades. They looked so detailed and impressive Rin wondered how they were staying attached to her body. She came around the side of the booth every now and then to talk to people that were entering the party. She looked as if she was welcoming guests and handing out party favors.

Her eyes came around to rest on Sosuke and her entire face lit up.

"Sosuke!" She cried and surprised the built butterfly swimmer by running over to him and throwing her arms around him in a hug. "I'm so glad you're here! I didn't think you would come."

"Ah, yeah." He averted his gaze and scratched the back of his neck. "Sorry about that. I've just been busy with stuff and forgot to answer you."

"Hnnnnnnnn, _stuuuuuff_? I wonder what could be more important than talking to me?" She teased.

Rin arched his brow as he watched the two go back and forth. Were these guys close friends or something? He didn't remember Sosuke mentioning anything about her.

It was then that the cute pinkette noticed Rin's existence and her face alighted anew with an enthusiastic smile.

"Who's this?" She asked. "Are you Sosuke's friend? I'm guessing so, seeing as how you guys are wearing matching costumes."

"Yeah." Rin dipped his head in a polite nod and smiled. "My name's Rin, and I'm with this guy right here." He gave Sosuke's calf a playful kick, from which Sosuke shirked away with an annoyed sound.

"Eh? _You're_ Rin?" The pink girl seemed very excited from this information. "Holy cow, I never thought I'd get to meet you! Sosuke would talk about you all the time when he was with us at my school!"

"Tch, Ren…" Sosuke grumbled, trying not to look embarrassed.

"Ren?" Rin thought Sosuke had just mispronounced his name at first.

"Yeah! That's my name, by the way: Ren Kougari. It's nice to meet you finally."

"Thanks. It's good to meet you too."

"Alright, well, we'll be go-"

"Ah! Wait just a second you two!" Ren said, catching Sosuke by his sleeve. "You're not out of the water yet. You guys still have to pick which color bracelets you'll wear."

"Colored...bracelets?" Rin's eyes glanced down on the booth table's top and saw an assortment of blue, pink and green glow in the dark bracelets scattered across its surface.

"Mmmhmm!" Ren winked one of her dark red orbs in a playful fashion. "The different colored bracelets let the other party-goers know what you're interested in: wear pink if you're into girls, blue if you're into guys, or green if you just don't care! This way, people don't have to beat around the bush or play guessing games before coming over to get to know you. It saves time and avoids uncomfortable situations."

"Hnnn…" _that's actually a pretty smart idea_ , Rin thought to himself as his own red disks evaluated the bracelets on the table.

Ren ran back around the other side of the booth. "So, boys, what'll it be?"

"Rin will have a green one." Sosuke spoke up before Rin even had a chance to get words out.

"H-hey-!"

"Alright, one green bracelet. And for you, Sosuke?"

Sosuke merely tucked his hands in his pockets and looked away, appearing indifferent as always. "I don't need one." Was all he said.

"Eeeeeh? Aaw, you're no fun at all, Sosuke. But that's alright, there are plenty of people that come just for the party and aren't interested in that sort of thing. I should have guessed that Sosuke-kun wouldn't be interested in anyone…" The corners of Ren's mouth pulled into a playful smile and she leaned across the booth towards Sosuke, her low-cut costume showing off cleavage. "I do wonder what kind of person is Sosuke's type-"

"Let's go, Rin." The butterfly simmer obviously wasn't interested in where the conversation was headed, and started walking towards the door.

"Aww boo, you suck!" Ren teased but then waved them off with a smile. "Have fun, you two! I'll be in there in a minute!"

"That wasn't nice to just walk off like that." Rin chided.

Sosuke sighed. "Ren's nice, but after a while she can get on my nerves."

Rin couldn't help but laugh at this.

"What?"

"Nothing."

As soon as they walked across the threshold into the warehouse a cacophony of noise crashed over their heads like waves: The music boomed so loud Rin could feel the vibrations reverberating through his chest. There was laughing and screaming and cheering. Rin didn't know where to go first.

"Hey." He turned to Sosuke, and felt a little shocked that he couldn't even hear his own voice. Naturally the brunette hadn't noticed he'd said anything because the music was too loud. "Hey!" Rin shouted, finally catching Sosuke's attention. "What should we do first?"

Sosuke seemed to ponder for a moment, then held up a finger signalling for Rin to wait a moment. He began to walk off and Rin felt a stab of anxiety go through him.

"Oi, wait a sec-!" He called, reaching after his friend but Sosuke had already taken off into the crowd. Rin stood there alone somewhat awkwardly by himself in the meantime, not knowing where to go or who to approach. His scowl deepened when he saw his best friend reappear from the crowd holding two dripping wet soda cans.

"What's wrong?" He vaguely heard Sosuke say as he handed Rin a can of soda.

The redhead snatched the beverage out of his hand and cracked it open. "Don't just go running off like that."

"Oh, sorry."

After taking a swig of soda Rin's eyes surveyed the party through the gloomy haze. There was a dance floor further in front of them packed with gyrating bodies of all different shapes and colors. Seeing so many exotic-looking individuals all huddled together made Rin think of a colorful aquarium of fish. Up on a dias, clearly visible over the heads of the tumultuous surf, was the DJ behind his control panel, looking cool and collected as if there wasn't a pack of rowdy teenagers high on sugar and hormones at his feet. Over on the sides of the warehouse there were long tables with party foods and punch bowls. Rin saw doors to the men and women's bathrooms, and noticed that there was a black, metallic infrastructure over the huge, single room of the ware house made up of catwalks and stairs.

"So…" Rin took another sip of his soda. "What now?"

"Well, we came here for a reason, didn't we?"

Rin felt dread sink down his throat to the pit of his stomach. That's right. He'd nearly forgotten that he and Sosuke had come here on a mission to try new things for him.

Rin saw Sosuke nod his head over in the direction of a guy standing all by himself over by the punch bowl. He had an air about him that seemed unapproachable. Perhaps it was his tall stature or his intense purple eyes, or it might have been the fact that his handsome features were accentuated with costume makeup to look darkened and wolfish. Two fangs poked out from his mouth and rested on his full lower lip, and a pair of brown fluffy ears protruded out of his shocking neon blue hair. Rin wondered if it was a wig or if it was an insanely good dye job. He'd never seen a color so loud before. The guy brought a plastic cup filled with red liquid up to his mouth to drink, and Rin noticed he had gone the extra mile to manicure fake, pointed claws on to his nails and put grungy makeup around his cuticles to make his paws look gruesome. On his wrist that was holding the cup a bright blue bracelet was clearly visible.

"What about that guy?"

"Yeah? What about him?"

"Why not go talk to him?"

Rin made a choking noise. "Right now? But...we just got here."

Sosuke's brow darkened. "You making excuses?"

"Idiot." Rin growled. "Of course I'm not. I just…" He sighed through his nose and brushed his red bangs out of his eyes. "At least give me a minute to get into things…"

"Alright. But I meant what I said before. Don't think I'm gonna let you get off so easy."

Rin decided not to entertain Sosuke's saucy attitude and remained silent. The redhead stood in limbo for a few long moments, waiting for the courage to speak to this person take control of his body. He waited, but with every passing second he felt his resolve fade. Rin was smart enough to know when something wasn't going to happen unless he forced himself to do it.

 _Get a grip, Rin._ He growled at himself, _You're never going to figure anything out for yourself if you stand here like a wallflower all night._ He tipped his head back and took a big gulp of his soda to steel his nerves with the sharp carbonated bite of his beverage.

"Here." He said, handing his can of soda to Sosuke, and forced his legs, one after another, to walk in the direction of the neon-blue werewolf.

* * *

 **Heeeeey guuuyys. Look, I know it's been over a month since I last updated but, it's like they say: stuff happens. Okay, so here's the skinny on the situation: I actually have a lot more written (what I have here is only 25 pages of over 50) but what I originally had written together for chapter 2 was way too damn long to post all together. The document was, as I said earlier, over 50 pages long and I still have things I want to accomplish. So, I decided that it was best if I split it up somewhere and this was the only place where I could see it evenly breaking off while still leaving a substantial amount of content. So, if you think the chapter ends in a weird way, that's why. But the good news is that all the fun stuff is coming up in the next chapter and I don't have much left to write before I'm done with it. So in the meantime, I know I'm taking forever, but just be patient.**

 **Even the smallest reviews give me inspiration to write more and help me when I feel like I can't write this story well enough. All comments are welcome.**

 **Bye bye for now**


	3. A Flickering Flame in the Darkness

**~*Chapter Three*~**

 **A Flickering Flame in the Darkness**

* * *

The question of what he should say to him did cross Rin's mind, but he suppressed the urge to consider the possible responses because he knew they would all be terrible, miserable failures. So he figured he might as well try to get his nerves under control in the mean time.

Rin came to a stop beside the punch bowl and served himself a drink. He stood there next to the werewolf with his drink in hand and his mouth parched for words.

Sensing someone beside him, the other male turned to look at Rin and locked gazes with him when he noticed Rin apparently wanted something. Those deep amethyst irises glared at Rin like toxic jellyfish, sending a zap through his entire body. No wonder nobody had been over here to socialize with him.

 _Okay, Rin...This is the part where you're supposed to say something._ The redhead tried to collect his thoughts and concoct something witty to say, something charming to get the conversation going in the right direction.

"Hey."

"Hi." The male answered back, and took a sip of his drink.

 _Fucking_ say _something, you idiot!_

"So uh…" Red orbs flickered over to Sosuke who was watching the whole thing happen. The brunette made a subtle rolling gesture with his hand, as if to say, _keep it going_. "It...doesn't look like you have a lot of friends."

If Rin could have slapped his hand to his face at that moment he would have. _That's the best you could come up with?! Seriously?_

But to Rin's surprise, instead of the werewolf's brow darkening from the insult, he merely sighed and leaned back against the table. "Yeah, I could see why you'd think that."

Rin remained quiet, both because he didn't know what else to say and also afraid of what other atrocities might fly out of his mouth.

"My mean-looking eyes have earned me a pretty bad reputation. Not many people feel safe talking to me."

"I see." Rin could understand where he was coming from. Sometimes he found himself in similar situations because of how serious he looked and of his foreboding-looking teeth. Rin bit his lower lip, mind scrambling for something to say. "So even though you look mean, you're actually a nice person. Is that what you're trying to say?"

"Well..." The werewolf sloshed his drink around inside his cup and smirked. "I didn't say that."

Rin arched one of his slender brows.

"I at least know someone at this party, though. I assume you know Ren, right?"

"Uh, yeah, we've met. But she's more of a…" Rin's eyes looked back over to where Sosuke was standing and he felt a small jolt of panic go through him when he noticed the butterfly simmer had disappeared. "...friend of a friend's."

"I getcha," The guy said, obviously not noticing Rin's internal peril. "That would make sense then; I was just thinking to myself that I don't think I've seen you before. What school do you go to?"

His question caught the redhead off guard and he almost slipped up by telling the kid his real school's name.

"Iwa...Iwatobi high school."

"Iwatobi…" The werewolf rolled the word around his head for a few seconds before shrugging. "Haven't heard of it. But I guess it doesn't matter what schools we're from, now does it?" That playful smirk graced his face once again, making his purple irises spark. "The name's Youji. What's yours?"

"It's Rin." At last, for once Rin felt like they were getting somewhere.

"Great. It's nice to have someone to talk to finally."

Just then a new beat started emanating from the dance floor and the werewolf's ears perked up.

"Shit, I love this song." Youji tipped his head back and downed his drink, expelling a hearty breath of air when he finished. His gruesome hand crushed the plastic cup and tossed it in a nearby trash can. "C'mon! Let's go dance."

Rin felt the floor to his stomach drop. _Dance?_ Rin's first instinct was to make some sort of excuse and refuse, or something else to get him out of this situation. It wasn't as if Rin didn't like dancing, he just wasn't accustomed to dancing in a setting like this, and completely without the security of his friends around. The floor was crowded, the music was fast paced, and he was all but entirely alone.

His fingers tightened around his plastic cup.

 _Quit making excuses, Rin. You came here for a reason, remember?_

Rin did the same as Youji and threw back his head to down his drink all at once. He felt a funny itching sensation as he gulped the liquid down. Once he finished the drink his face soured as a flavor like burning curdled in his throat and stomach.

He coughed and made a gagging noise. "Wh...what the hell?"

"Everything alright?"

"Yeah...just...weird tasting punch."

Youji let out a hearty laugh and clapped Rin on the back of the shoulder. "You're funny!"

Though Rin didn't know what he said or did that was so amusing.

"C'mon! Let's go!"

The werewolf left no room for Rin to protest, taking a hold of his wrist and dragging him towards the pulsating throng of people huddled around the dance floor.

"Ah! H-hey!"

Rin held his breath as they plunged into the small spaces between the bodies in the crowd. Once inside the two were enveloped in a cloud of heat and a musk of sweat and perfume. Youji was pulling them in deeper, expertly weaving through people as if he knew which way they were going to jive. Oddly enough, things were a bit more spread out towards the middle of the crowd. Rin wondered if more people liked to linger on the edges because that made it easier to leave if they wanted to.

Once they were in a comfortable spot, Youji let go of Rin's wrist. His loud neon colors glowed brightly underneath the purplish ultraviolet lights near the stage. His amethyst eyes connected with Rin's and he smiled, the small gesture made his usually paralyzing gaze seem warm. The werewolf closed his eyes then and his body melted into the beat of the song. His transition seemed so fluid, so natural, carefree. It was hard not to watch him and feel captivated. His features looked relaxed, completely absorbed in the beat that vibrated their bodies.

Rin couldn't exactly say the same for himself, though. Perhaps it was because this really wasn't a scene he frequented very often, but he couldn't see himself slipping into the music as seamless as Youji did. He felt stiff and unsure of what to do with his body.

"C'mon!" Youji yelled over the speakers. "Get moving!"

Rin did his best to try and 'get moving', but he couldn't help but feel like his movements were awkward and unflattering.

"That's it! You got it!" Youji came closer to him and started dancing in a ridiculous fashion around him, flailing his arms and throwing his head back and forth like a banshee. Rin's brow furrowed and wondered if he should just back away slowly...

"See?" Youji held up his arms as if to say 'look around'. "Nobody cares what you look like. Just go with it!" The other male gave a wolfish grin and went back to his dancing.

As juvenile as Youji's example was, it actually helped Rin's confidence. His red orbs flickered around the crowd and saw that indeed nobody really was watching them. They were all absorbed with the tunes and working their groove out in their own unique way.

Rin felt his head bobbing to the beat despite himself and started rocking his body with the rhythm. He began to get into it a bit more and brought his arms into the mix too. Rin still felt a little self conscious about how he looked, but when the person in front of him seemed so relaxed and having fun, it was hard for him to feel insecure about anything.

The chorus of the song came on and with it a new entrancing melody that nearly swept Rin off his feet. Throwing all his insecurities to the wind, the redhead allowed the music to play with his body as it pleased. His red head swung from side to side. His hips rocked back and forth to the booming beat in a precise yet fluid motion that made his already rock-hard and sexy body even more tantalizing. Soon, Rin lost himself to the music just as Youji had and closed his eyes, completely absorbed. A corner of his mouth quirked up into a half smile as he found himself starting to have a bit of fun. He gripped on to the visor of his police hat as he bobbed his head from side to side, both so it wouldn't fall off and also to assume a sassy air while he danced.

He felt something warm brush up against his hand holding his visor and then a moment later felt the weight of his hat leave his head. When he opened his eyes he saw that the frisky little werewolf in front of him had stolen the hat out of his hand and was now wearing it proudly between his two fluffy ears.

"Oi!" The redhead yelled and tried to snatch it back. But the mongrel was so quick on his feet, he evaded every one of Rin's swipes and even made it look like a dance while doing so. The conniving werewolf merely wagged his finger at Rin and winked. Rin's brow furrowed and his mouth flattened out to a line. Better off to just let it be for now, he supposed. He would get it back from Youji later.

The said teen had gone back to his dancing, completely oblivious to how much he'd riled up Rin. But Youji was dancing...a bit differently now. His movements were fluid, more sensual somehow. His features looked so relaxed, with his eyes closed, his thick lashes dusting over his high cheeks, and his full lips parted slightly. He bit down on his lower lip as he ran his hands up the front of his body and tangled them in his hair, as if any simple touch could ignite mind numbing pleasure across his skin.

Rin couldn't help but blush as he watched the other male dance before him. The situation felt somewhat similar to when Rin was looking at the erotic images in Sosuke's magazines, but this time the person wasn't dancing or blushing or touching themselves because there was a cheap monetary trade-off. Youji was here dancing like this in front of Rin...because he wanted to. And that completely changed how Rin's body accepted the stimuli.

He felt a distant stirring in his nether regions, and the strangest desire to reach out and touch Youji yearned in him. But of course he refrained from doing so. He hardly knew the kid, he wasn't about to go climbing all over him. Even if he did know him better...Rin wasn't the type of person that would do those things in public. Rin thought that if he couldn't get physical with this person who was eliciting such feelings in him, then at least he might be able to dance back, and give Youji a show of his own, right?

Rin ran one of his hands down his front while he pulled the elastic out of his red hair with the other, making his locks free to move with him as he danced. Moving around and being in such cramped quarters had Rin burning with heat in just minutes. No longer hindered by hesitation, Rin's fingers expertly began to undo the button-up front of his police officer uniform, exposing a white wifebeater underneath. Soon he had the whole thing undone, and the flaps to his shirt hung open, exposing the clean white fabric that hung tightly to his ripped body. His ab muscles flexed as he moved his upper body in waves. He smiled, feeling ridiculous, knowing how he probably looked, but on a second thought he realized that he didn't give a shit.

Suddenly, Rin felt someone's hands on his hips and a flat body pressed up against his back and he stiffened. Hands with long, grotesque nails found themselves on the front of his hips and were feeling up the small grooves of his abs as they moved their way up the front of his body, traveling closer towards his chest.

"Hey!" Rin shouted and pushed the body that was immediately behind him away, sending that person stumbling into an innocent bystander in the process. "What the hell's your…!"

To the redhead's surprise, the mystery gropper turned out to be Youji, purple eyes gone wide and mouth rounded from shock. Rin's surprise quickly gave way to anger that had his cheeks burning pink.

"Why, you…" He growled.

Though Youji couldn't hear him, Rin was sure his venomous expression was enough to make the werewolf give a sheepish smile and scratch the back of his fluffy head.

Rin had half a mind to tell him off, but felt even more frustrated knowing that the guy wouldn't even be able to hear him where they were. Not caring whether Youji would follow or not, Rin turned on his heel and stalked his way through the crowd and off of the dance floor.

"Wait!" He heard someone cry once he was far enough away from the speakers. Turning around revealed the neon-blue wolf chasing after him, huffing and puffing, about to blow the damn house down. "You...ran off…"

"And _you_ groped me." Rin growled, having Youji all submissive again.

"Alright, I get it-I'm sorry! I just got carried away and wasn't thinking, okay?"

Rin let out a calming breath through his nostrils but still held Youji in place with a half lidded stare.

"I mean it, honestly: We were both having so much fun-or at least, I was-and I saw you were too and…" Youji averted his purple orbs and rubbed the back of his neck. "...And...the way you were dancing...I acted without thinking. Besides, I didn't think you would get so mad about it. Anyways, I'm really sorry, okay?"

Rin wasn't about to forgive him just yet, but he didn't see the sense in holding a grudge over something so petty either. He was in the tender moment right after an offense and needed time to get over it a bit.

Youji, seeming to sense this, removed the police cap from the top of his head and handed it back to Rin.

"Look, I'm an ass, okay? You said it yourself: I don't really have a lot of friends. But you're different somehow. I'd like it if you didn't stay mad at me because I'd like for us to be friends."

Rin felt some of his anger soften at that comment, making his harsh gaze lighten up a bit.

"I'll see you around then?" Youji's tone sounded hopeful, but still left room for Rin to decline if he wanted.

"Yeah…"

That response seemed good enough to the other male as he turned back towards the dance floor and left Rin with a smile.

"What was that just now?" Came a voice from behind and above him, causing the redhead to spin on his heel. Apparently Sosuke had appeared right behind him like his fairy god mother. The brunette's blue eyes shifted over Rin's wrinkled uniform and messy hair. "What the hell happened to you in there?"

Rin blushed and turned away slightly to start buttoning his shirt back up. "Nothing happened. We just danced, that's all."

"I've never seen people's shirts unbutton themselves while they dance. But whatever."

Rin felt his agitation flare when he saw the teasing smirk curled on Sosuke's mouth. "Tch, who asked you, anyway..."

"Hi boys!" Came a familiar, sing-song voice from beside them.

"Oh, it's Ren again."

"Weeeeeeeelll, look at you, mister sassy pants with your hair all crazy and shirt all undone. Tell me, they eat you alive on the dance floor, or what?"

Rin blinked and averted his gaze, red brow furrowing. "Not really."

"Well, that'll happen to ya at a place like this. Gottah keep your wits about you, otherwise the big bad wolf might gobble you up!"

Rin's eyes went wide and he felt his cheeks sting. Did Ren just happen to make a coincidental reference or had she seen them dancing?

"Anyways, stick around, boys." She winked one of her red orbs over towards Sosuke. "The real fun is about to begin." And with that she continued sashaying towards the stage in her three-inch heels.

"I can see what you mean about her getting on your nerves." Rin sighed.

It was Sosuke's turn to chuckle this time, the sound rumbling like waves crashing upon a shore.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"By the way, where did you go that whole time?"

Sosuke's smile fell and he stuffed his hands in his pockets, looking away. "No where, really."

Rin fixed him in place with a scrutinous stare.

"I just had something to take care of. That's all."

Rin didn't push the subject any further. He could take a hint when Sosuke didn't want to talk about something. He would try to remember to pester it out of him later.

" _AAAAAAALLLRIGHT LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, HOW'RE WE DOIN' TONIIIIGHT?_ "

A terribly loud voice yelled over the speakers, assailing Rin's still tender eardrums. Rin looked over towards the stage and saw a pink-haired angel up there next to the DJ, who looked loath to relinquish his equipment to the little thing.

The crowd answered her with hearty screams and yells.

" _Great! Awesome! I'm glad to hear it. Thank you, all of you, for making time to come to my party. M'glad you all have been having a great night so far, but now it's about to get even better. I'm gonna need everyone to clear off the dance floor for our next event! Go on! Move ya butts!"_

There was a slight commotion as the tightly packed crowd dispersed and cleared off the dance floor.

"I wonder what's going on?" Rin thought aloud.

"Beats me."

" _Alright, that's great guys, now while we get things set up I'm gonna hand the mic over to the fabulous guy hosting this event so he can give you the run-down on the rules. Everybody make some noise for my boy, the Bloody Baron!"_

The crowd rose with applause as a young man with dark red hair dressed in a lavish pimp costume, complete with furry cape and wide brimmed hat, made his way on stage.

"Is he someone from your old school?"

"No." Sosuke blinked his teal eyes as he watched the guy climb on stage. "I don't recognize him."

" _Evenin', everybody! It's time for the event you've all been waiting for: It's! The Bloody Baron's Ballsy Body Paint-Off Challenge!"_

The crowd went into an uproar with excitement, as if they knew what this event was already and were extremely impatient for it. Rin wondered, was this an event that Ren liked to host often at her parties? Rin looked up and finally noticed that there was a big image of the baron being projected on a very large screen against the wall, making it easier for everyone in the crowd to see him. Over the speakers the bloody baron's voice continued.

" _Alright, alright!"_ The baron chided the overzealous crowd. " _I can tell you guys are excited to start so I'll hold off on explaining the rules for now, since most of y'all already know'em, and just get straight to the part that you care about most: The prizes!_ "

"I can only imagine what the prizes will be like." Rin said, looking around the renovated warehouse and noting all the food and technical equipment. "This party doesn't look like it was cheap to begin with."

"Ren's parents are exceedingly rich." Sosuke said. "But she doesn't have an ego about it or anything. Her parents still make her work for the things she wants."

Over the speakers the baron went on.

" _Like last time we've got some fabulous prizes here for you tonight, courtesy of the Kougari kid's parents, so y'all can thank them later. For third place we've got a pair of tickets to go to Japan's hottest food district for a night on the town. Eat as much as you want with these Bottomless Pit tickets. Try exotic fish, fruits and fronds at over twenty different restaurants who accept the passes listed on the backs of the tickets."_

Rin chuckled. "I bet Momo would like that one. I can just imagine him stuffing his dumb face full of sweets."

"Screw Momo. I'll take both of them myself and you two can eat cafeteria food."

Rin snickered and playfully elbowed Sosuke in the side. "Fatass."

" _Next, for the second place prize, we have two_ highly coveted _badges for the exclusive Hokkaido Sports Expo happening next month at the Hokkaido Convention Center!"_

Rin's mouth reflexively popped open and he took in a sharp breath. Registration for that expo had sold out _months_ ago. Rin knew this because he'd heard of the event and thought that it would be a good thing to bring his team to as a club trip. The school certainly had the funds for it, and the tickets weren't that absurdly priced so Rin thought he could make it happen. But by the time he had gotten all the right administrators to sign off on the approvals, all the badges had been bought up. The only way to get badges for the expo now was to buy them off people who had bought passes in bulk while they were on sale, but of course they were significantly more expensive that way...

" _Want a chance to brush elbows with the greats and get an inside look at what's hot in the sports world right now? Then this expo is just the thing for you! But we're not just talkin' sports here, people. Oh no! Top of the line vendors will be there handing out samples of their latest products, olympic and major league athletes hold Q &A sessions, there's signings, there's the dealers room that sells exclusive never before seen merchandise, there's all sorts of panels that talk about every kind of sport you can think of and recruiters looking for fresh meat roam the halls talking to young athletes at free random! If you're a jock, and Ren tells me a lot of you guys are, then you won't want to pass up these babies!"_

"Sosuke…" Came Rin's soft voice, not even caring to listen to what the extravagant first place prize must be.

"I know."

Rin looked to Sosuke and found the brunette already looking back at him, blue eyes set with determination. It would appear that his best friend understood Rin's intentions with just a single word.

"We _have_ to get those badges. I don't care what it takes."

"We'll have to compete, you know." Sosuke warned.

"I'm aware of that...I don't care _what_ we have to do."

Sosuke looked as though he was about to say something, but the bloody baron had apparently finished his explanation of the final prize and cut him off with his loud voice before he had a chance to say anything.

" _Alright then! So who among you will be brave enough to compete in my challenge?"_

"C'mon, let's go. Now!"

"Right."

The two tried to rush through the crowd as politely as they could, bumping into several people in the process. In a matter of seconds the two police officers emerged from the line of people into the clearing of the dance floor where three large, blue tarps were set up.

" _Aaaaaaah, what's this? Do we have our first set of challengers?!"_

Sosuke and Rin both nodded their heads with serious expressions on their face, which was rather comical given the atmosphere of the party.

" _Awesome! But we still need two more groups of two to get this game started. C'mon now, you cowards! You were all screaming for more just a minute ago. Where'd your courage go? And in the face of such fabulous prizes, who could resist!"_

It seemed to Rin that this was the type of event that a lot of people came to watch but only few were willing to participate in. It was kind of like when his friends back in elementary school would play truth or dare: you played the game to see the dares but just about everybody would pick truth. The redhead shared his curiosity with the baron: why were people so hesitant to join this game?

Eventually the baron was able to harass two other pairs of people into coming out and joining the event.

" _There we go! Now that I've got you guys locked in I'll explain the rules for the people that might be first timers: I had my guys set up three stations of tarps, bottles of paint and brushes on the dance floor as you can all see. In each of the pairs, one of you's gotta be the painter, and the other is gonna be the model, you followin me? Each group will be given a picture of a character from pop fiction. The character can be from anything: movies, books, manga, anime-the sky's the limit! The painter's job is to paint a knock-out costume of said character on to the body of your model in fifteen minutes. At the end of the time limit, the pair that has the best looking 'costume' wins!_ "

Rin's brow furrowed in puzzlement. 'Paint a costume on to the model'? How were they supposed to do that when Rin was already wearing…

Rin's heart sank to the pit of his stomach.

...no, they couldn't mean…

" _Alright! Models, start your engines! We're gonna need you to strip all the way down to your skivvies!_ "

Rin cheeks flushed with heat as a bunch of cat-calls ran through the crowd.

"...Skivvies?"

"He means underwear."

"I know what it means." Rin bristled, then collected himself with a sigh. "Alright fine. Go on then, get undressed."

"What for? I'm being the painter."

"Oi! Who said _you_ get to be the painter?"

"I did. Just now." Sosuke crossed his arms and gave his friend a firm glare. "You're the one who dragged us into this. Why should I be the one to humiliate myself?"

Rin's mind ran a mile a minute trying to find an excuse to match Sosuke's argument but came up flat. His dark red orbs flickered over to the giant projector and his heart rate sped up when he saw all three teams broadcasted on the big screen for the whole crowd to see. He looked around him and saw the models on the other teams starting to strip off their costumes. Panic seized his body, making him freeze.

"Weren't you the one who said you didn't care what we had to do?"

"Yeah but I didn't think I would have to get half naked in front of a crowd of people!"

" _Girls, girls! You're both pretty!"_ Rin heard the baron announce over the speakers, obviously noticing their deliberation. " _We don't care which one of you's the model, so stop arguing!"_

"What do you want to do?" Sosuke stood in front of Rin as solid and as unmovable as a stone statue. "You gonna back out now?"

Rin heard the taunt in his friend's words and clenched his teeth in anger from the insult.

The red-eyed shark clenched his hands into fists at his side. "Hell no. I said I didn't care and I meant it."

Rin's fingers started to undo the button-up front of his police officer uniform. He shrugged the piece of clothing off nonchalantly, exposing his bare shoulders and toned arm muscles. Next his fingers worked at the belt buckle securing his pants around his waist. The metal clinked and his zipper made that characteristic noise as he shoved that part of his clothing off of himself too, it falling to the floor in a heap around his ankles. He kicked them off in addition to his socks and shoes, leaving him in just his white undershirt and a pair of tight-clinging, black boxer briefs.

Rin looked out into the crowd and saw everyone, male and female alike, with their eyes glued to him eagerly watching and waiting for him to remove the last article of clothing from his body. The nervousness made his arms feel like they were filled with lead. His sluggish fingers hooked under the hem of his shirt, and like ripping off a bandaid, Rin pulled it up and over his head quickly to get it over with.

The action exposed his fully toned pectoral and abdominal muscles, making a light flush dust his cheeks.

He could hear the people in the crowd immediately in front of him whispering, murmuring, and giggling.

Rin shook his head to try and get a grip on himself. He had no idea what they were talking about, he reminded himself. It was foolish to think that they were all talking about him. After all, he wasn't the only person up there without any clothes on, though in his opinion Rin thought he had the best body among the models. He tried to keep his breathing even and remain calm, though that was hard to do when he could hear his own heart hammering in his ears.

It was strange for him to be reacting this way, he realized, considering how he went to events where he would be half naked with spectators watching all the time. But he reasoned that this situation was completely different because here the people were watching exclusively for his body while at his swimming competitions the people were more so watching him swim, not devouring his body with their eyes.

" _Okay, now to reveal tonight's theme for the game…"_ The baron removed a sealed envelope from somewhere on his person and slowly opened it for dramatic effect.

" _Tonight's theme is...Disney Princess!"_

Rin nearly buried his face in his hands. This couldn't be happening. Could things get any _more_ embarrassing?

" _My lovely assistant will now hand out the pictures of your assigned characters."_

Someone emerged from the base of the stage and handed out pieces of paper as she walked by the painters.

Rin saw Sosuke's cerulean blue eyes look over the piece of paper he was given and his brow furrowed.

"What is it?" Rin called out. "Let me see."

Sosuke flipped the paper over to show a thin, smiling mermaid with a flowing mane of red hair.

"Who is-"

" _Okay then, so everyone's got their reference picture? We all set? Remember, you've got fifteen minutes to transform your model into that character. Okay, ready? Painters, on your marks!"_

Sosuke bent over and was about to reach for the paint bottles and brushes when Rin saw him freeze.

"What? What is it?"

He noticed a bead of sweat forming near Sosuke's brow.

"The...the costumes…" He murmured.

"What about them?"

" _Get ready!"_

Without any further explanation, Sosuke started to unbutton his shirt and kick off his socks and shoes. Rin floundered to work his words out as he watched Sosuke undo his belt buckle and start stripping his pants off.

"I-idiot! Why are _you_ -?"

" _Aaaand go!"_

The other painters exploded into action, grabbing for their paint brushes and slathering colors on to their models, while Sosuke still stumbled to remove the rest of his clothing.

"Oi!" Rin yelled, demanding to be answered. " _What_ are you doing?"

" _Whoooaa! What do we have going on here folks?!"_ The bloody baron shouted, directing everyone's attention to Rin and Sosuke's team in the middle. " _In my many years of hosting this event I've never seen the likes of this! We have_ two people _on one team daring enough to get down to just their undies?! Let's give it up for group two!"_

"Sosuke!" Rin hissed over the crowd's cheering. "Put your damn clothes back on and stop wasting time!"

"Not a chance." The butterfly swimmer said in an expulsion of breath as he pulled his shirt off over his head. "These costumes don't belong to us. We can't afford to get a single drop of paint on them. It would reflect poorly on you as captain, and on the whole swim team, if you handed these back to the theater club in anything less than the condition they were given to us."

As much as Rin wanted to disagree with Sosuke he found that what he was saying actually made a world of sense. He felt a little disappointed in himself that he could forget such an important thing, and silently gave credit to Sosuke for being on top of things when he couldn't.

"Besides, I've got some time. Our character is barely wearing anything."

Rin recalled the image of the half naked mermaid and deduced that Sosuke had a point.

Finally left in nothing but a pair of dark blue boxer briefs, Sosuke bent over to begin his work. He picked up a broad brush and started squirting out the large amounts of green that they would need for the mermaid's tail on the tarp. Without even giving Rin a warning, Sosuke slapped the brush with the cold, wet paint on to his midriff, making Rin shiver. He worked the green over the hem of Rin's boxers and down below. Rin tried to ignore the weird sensation of the paint seeping through his clothes and to feel those touches around such an inappropriate part of his body. Instead he tried to focus on the prize at the end of the tunnel, the reason that they both were doing all of this...but it just felt so embarrassing!

 _Mind over matter, Rin_. He kept telling himself. _Mind over matter!_

Suddenly Rin felt the soft bristles of the brush poking at him through his underwear give way to a sharp metal edge. He looked down and his heart dropped at what he saw.

Sosuke was there kneeling in front of him, looking at the paint brush he was just using with his mouth agape. But the paint brush could no longer even be called such because the part that had held the bristles together had fallen off, and now the brush was just a stick with a metal band around the broad end of it.

 _Are you serious with this?_...Rin lacked the capacity to say the words, but thought them just the same. _They spent thousands of yen on this party but couldn't even invest in some decent paint brushes?_

"It broke?! You've gottah be kidding."

"There's no time." Throwing down the useless paint brush, Sosuke picked up the bottle of green paint and squirted as much as he could into his palms.

Rin growled. "Great, _now_ what are you-" The redhead's sentence died in his throat as Sosuke slapped those cold and wet palms on to Rin's thigh and began painting across his skin with nothing but his bare hands. The butterfly swimmer smeared the paint up Rin's thigh, heading towards his boxers and Rin stiffened. He reflexively shoved Sosuke's arms away and stepped back.

"Are you crazy!" Rin yelled.

"Are _you_ crazy?" His best friend shouted back at him, dark brows angry. "Are you saying you want us to have wasted our time and embarrassed both of ourselves for nothing just because our paint brush broke?"

" _Woah! Just when you think things couldn't get any more hot! Now painter number two has abandoned using his brush in place of running his hands sensually up his partner! Talk about sexy!"_

Rin blushed at least fifty shades of pink before his pallette arrived at a dark, humiliated red.

"Don't go yelling stuff you know nothing about!" Rin shouted as best he could over at the bloody baron. "We're not like that!"

"Would you sit still for a god damn minute?" Sosuke pulled Rin back into the proper standing position on the tarp and once again loaded his hands up with green paint. "Look, I'll do this as fast as I can, alright?"

Rin didn't even have a chance to argue with his best friend before Sosuke's hands were on him again. Rin decided that, like it or not, Sosuke had a point in that they came all this way and already went through so much humiliation getting undressed in front of the entire crowd. They might as well stick it out and hope to get their prize. Either way they were leaving there with something: there were three groups and three prizes, so it wasn't as if they were going to walk away with nothing but all of this might as well have been for nothing if they couldn't get the prize that they wanted.

Rin clenched his eyes shut and simply let Sosuke's hands do their thing. He tried to bring his mind to another place, away from the humiliation and awkwardness of the situation. He tried to imagine them walking the halls at the Hokkaido Convention center, going through the halls with those shiny badges around their necks, looking at the panel schedules, trying to decide which athlete they wanted to go see-

Sosuke's hands started playing up into his nether regions and there was no way Rin could ignore it. He bit back pitiful whining noises as Sosuke's fingers did the best they could to paint the green substance across his groin as quickly as possible without being too obtrusive. But fingers were such an odd device for application. Even though Rin was sure Sosuke was trying to get done with the area as quick as possible, the larger male had to keep going back and applying more color. Plus, the fact that the color kept sinking into the dark fabric of Rin's boxers didn't exactly help the situation.

"Jesus...Sosuke…" Rin growled, tears pooling on the corners of his eyes from the sheer mortification.

"I know, I didn't ask for this either, okay?"

Rin kept his legs clamped together and silently thanked his lucky stars when his best friend didn't ask for him to spread them. As long as he kept them pressed together, the 'costume' would work for presentation's sake.

"Alright, I'm all done up front. Turn around."

Rin quickly shuffled himself around, careful to keep his legs pressed together. Rin let out a yelp as two large and wet hands slapped themselves on to both of his cheeks and started working the paint over his backside. Unable to withstand the embarrassment any further, Rin buried his blushing face into his hands and sulked.

God damn him. Rin understood that Sosuke wasn't half-assing things here because he was as motivated as Rin was about winning that prize but...did he really need to be _that_ thorough?

Sosuke's hands felt so large. One hand could easily cover each cheek, and in fact from the feel of things that was exactly what Sosuke was trying to do. His hands made quick work of smoothing the paint down over Rin's bottom, then they moved down the backs of his thighs and calves.

"The tail's done." Turning back around, Rin watched Sosuke wring his hands clean with some paper towels and squirt some purple paint on to his fingers.

"What else do you have to d-"

Not wasting any time with verbal directions, his best friend looped an arm around Rin's waist and pulled him closer towards him so that they were less than an arm's breadth apart. Rin hadn't been aware of how cool the room around them was until he could feel the waves of heat rolling off of Sosuke's body and on to his skin. A shiver lept down Rin's spine as he felt something cold and wet play across his nipples. He soon realized that what he was feeling was Sosuke's rough thumbs drawing against his skin once again. The solitary butterfly simmer's fingers ran across Rin's skin, making the sensitive flesh harden under his touch.

"For crying out loud…" Rin growled through his teeth. "Could you _be_ any more embarrassing?"

Oddly enough though, Sosuke didn't respond back to Rin's rebuke like he expected him to. The brunette's teal colored eyes looked entranced, captivated by what they were doing, Rin's harsh comment going completely unnoticed. Rin thought he felt Sosuke's fingers slow for just a fraction of a second as they dragged across his skin. But then they continued their hasty work by filling in the shape of the purple seashells going across his chest. Rin deduced that Sosuke must have had trouble recalling what the character looked like for a second, that's all.

" _Alright, aaaaannnd...time! Painters, put your materials down and step away from your models!"_

The warmth of Sosuke's hands left his skin as the brunette obeyed the baron's command and backed away from his model. Rin looked down on himself and thought that, while their character didn't have much going on to begin with, Sosuke did a pretty good job considering all the obstacles that were thrown their way. Rin looked to his left and right to judge their competition. It was hard to tell if Sosuke's work could earn them the second place prize. In Rin's opinion, all three models looked to be on the same level. But that wasn't saying much, maybe amateur at best.

" _So this is the way we'll decide the winners: We're gonna place the groups in first, second and third by applause. When you see my assistant hold her hand over a pair, make as much noise as you can for your favorite duo. Make sure you only cheer for the one you want to win! Okay, everyone ready? Give it up for group one with Princess Jasmine!"_

The crowd made a respectful amount of noise for the first pair of people. Next, the assistant made her way over to Rin and Sosuke and held her hand over their heads.

" _And now, for our hot and fiery, fruit of the loom boys, make some noise for group two with Princess Ariel!"_

Immediately, the crowd exploded with cheering and feminine screams coming from both males and females alike. Sosuke and Rin blushed at the overwhelming support from the audience, and also from the aggressive cat calls directed at both of them.

 _Uh oh..._ Rin had a sinking feeling. It was going to be pretty hard for the next group to top that level of excitement. At any other time Rin would have gladly flaunted their victory, but when they were trying to place for second...

" _And last, but certainly not least, group three with Princess Rapunzel!"_

Just as Rin had feared, the applause that the last group received was notably a lot better than the first group's, but still didn't even come close to his and Sosuke's. Which meant...

" _Wow! For once we actually decided very cleanly! We didn't even have to do a dance battle to settle the score! I think it's pretty clear then: In third place, taking home the delicious bottomless pit tickets, we have group one with Princess Jasmine. In second place, winning those wonderful, shiny badges to the sports Expo is group three with Princess Rapunzel!"_

All the air in Rin's body left him in a sigh that completely deflated his posture. He ran his fingers through his hair and clenched at the strands in frustration, trying to beat back the small tears of aggravation from having lost.

"Uuuggh...what the hell...I can't believe this..."

"Well, we didn't _lose_. Technically we did win."

"Oh yeah, that's right." Wait a minute, try as hard as Rin might he couldn't recall what the first place prize was. And that's when he remembered that he wasn't paying attention because at that time he was distracted talking to Sosuke. "What is the first place prize anyway?"

Sosuke just shrugged. He didn't need to have the answers though, because the baron was about to explain.

" _And by a landslide, claiming the first place prize...is sexy group two with Princess Ariel!"_

The crowd erupted with applause once again, forcing Rin and Sosuke to wave back to them at least until they settled down some so the baron could explain what they won. To Rin's horror, a pair of stage hands emerged from somewhere holding a dazzling rhinestone princess tiara. The teen stiffened and frowned as the two slowly brought the thing down on to his head, crowning him in his first place victory.

" _Congratulations you two. You've just landed yourselves an all expenses paid couples weekend trip to Disneyland in Tokyo!"_

Rin blanched. "Uuuh….what?" A _couples_ trip?

" _Oooooh I know! You're so excited to get alone together! I can see it in your face!"_

"What did I just say!" Rin shouted, but bit back his temper, knowing that it was futile to try and argue with him. The guy was probably wanting to see a rise out of him anyway.

"Here are your tickets guys. Congratulations."

Rin accepted the envelope from the stage assistant with a resigned look. He cast a glance over to the third group and felt one last spark of hope go through him. He hadn't noticed before but the model painted as Rapunzel was given a long blonde wig at some point. It was braided and fitted with a bunch of fake flowers, but was still long enough to go down to the guy's butt.

"Hey." Rin said, making his way over to them. "You guys don't want those badges. Trade with us. This is the first place prize, to Disneyland. Isn't this the better prize?" There it was. There was the pitch from Rin, master negotiator.

"No way!" Rapunzel stuck his tongue out and pulled down one of his eyelids. "These badges are the whole reason we played this stupid game in the first place. Get lost!" With that, the model tossed his blond hair over his shoulder with a catty attitude and started walking away with his partner.

Rin ground his teeth and his cheeks flushed from anger. "Rrrr…why you..."

"Hey." Sosuke caught his hotheaded friend by the shoulder before he could take off after them. "Forget about them. We have to pick up our things and get out of here."

Rin turned his attention back behind him and saw the stage hands already back on the floor cleaning things up so that the party could get back going again.

He let out a sigh that sounded like a growl. "Sorry…I guess I'm just mad that we went through all that for nothing."

"Well...I don't know if I'd say we went through it for nothing."

Rin frowned and raised a brow at his friend.

"I mean, we didn't get the prize that we wanted, but at least we weren't bored."

Rin groaned and ran his fingers through his hair. "You really are something else, you know that?"

Sosuke scooped up the two bundles of their clothes, seeing as how Rin might still have wet paint on him. "C'mon, let's go get you cleaned up."

* * *

"Rin." Came the knock at the men's bathroom door. "Hurry up. There's people waiting."

Rin looked at himself in the mirror and his handsome face soured at the half scrubbed image he saw reflected back at him. The damn paint that had dried on him wasn't coming off. And it didn't help the situation that there was no paper towels left in the bathroom so all he had to work with was some cheap two-ply toilet paper.

He gave a loud and resigned sigh. "Yeah, I'll be right out."

Rin had tossed his soaked boxers away in the trash can of the one-man bathroom. They were beyond saving, completely covered in green paint that had now hardened and had the flexibility and consistency of sandpaper against his sensitive skin. The rest of the paint on his body had dried, and his clothes covered everything well enough. So he slipped on his costume and finally emerged from the bathroom.

"Finally!" A random stranger shouted and all but bowled over Rin as he forced his way into the men's bathroom and slammed the door, locking it.

Rin raised his eyebrows but then shook his head. He didn't even want to entertain the question of what that guy's emergency was.

"There you are." Rin looked up to see Sosuke waiting for him out there, fully dressed in his police office uniform already. "Everything alright?"

"Yeah." He sighed once more. "I just wasn't able to scrub the paint off…"

Sosuke sputtered and laughed, the gesture making his whole face brighten and seem warm.

"Oi." Rin pouted. "Shut up."

"Sorry…" Sosuke said, though he was still chuckling.

The corners of Rin's mouth turned downwards. He brushed past his friend, heading for the tables that lined the wall on the opposite side of the room.

"Hey, c'mon." Sosuke called after him, following behind. "Don't cry."

"I'm not crying, idiot." He sighed then, coming to a stop in front of the punch bowls. "I need something to drink." That whole ordeal of humiliating himself in front of a crowd of people had him thirsting something fierce. Rin served himself a full cup of the red liquid and drank as much as he could before he had to stop. That burning flavor was there again, but this time it was even stronger than Rin remembered. The burning sensation coupled with the cheap cherry flavor of the drink reminded him of cough medicine. It wasn't a pleasant experience, but the only other thing to drink was soda, which Rin knew would only dehydrate him further. So he gulped down the rest of his drink, coughing and made a disgusted face when he was done.

"Uuuugh...god."

"What?"

"Nothing." Rin said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

" _Evening, everybody."_ Came a mellow voice over the speakers. Rin looked over to the stage and saw the DJ speaking into the mic. His features, hair and skin colors were as mellow as his voice. Very pale skin, and hair so blonde it nearly looked silver. " _I was forced into agreeing to play one slow dance song for the evening, so here it is."_ The DJ continued, despite the mixed reactions from the crowd of people on the dance floor. " _If you don't like it then go home. Here we go, grab your bae or ya boo and get slow."_

"A slow dance…" Rin's brow furrowed. This was the last place he expected to see-

"Hey!" Someone called, making both males turn their attention to the side.

"Youji?"

The werewolf smiled as he drew near. "You two weren't bad out there. Congratulations on winning first place."

"Oh, thanks. But, we weren't trying to."

"Whaaaat?" Youji smirked and then shook his head. "You guys are weird."

"Oh yeah, by the way Sosuke…"

Rin quickly introduced the two.

Youji nodded. "Good to meet you."

"Yeah." Was Sosuke's short reply.

"Anyways, Rin...I uh…" Youji's cheeks flushed a light pink and he smiled, scratching the back of his fluffy head. "I was gonna ask if you wanted to dance with me?"

Rin blinked and wondered if the surprise that he felt from Youji's question was as plain on his face as he thought it was.

"Trust me, I've learned my lesson from last time. I'll play nice." The werewolf offered his clawed hand out for Rin to accept. "Would you want to?"

"I...uh…" Rin felt a soft push come from his backside, making him stumble forward a bit.

He looked back to see Sosuke putting his foot back down into standing position with his usual stoic expression on his face.

"Go for it, idiot." Sosuke softened his words with a small smile. "Isn't this the whole reason we came here?"

"Yeah, I guess…" Rin's red orbs flickered over towards the dance floor where he saw plenty of people already dancing. He saw couples of all different shapes, sizes and gender. There were even a few couples out there of big built guys like himself, making some of Rin's shyness melt away. Rin cast one last glance towards his best friend, looking for some sort of assurance.

Sosuke's smile only warmed as he dipped his head in a subtle nod.

Youji was still holding his hand out for Rin to accept.

"Sure, alright." The redhead agreed and scratched the back of his neck. "But, you don't have to hold out your hand like that, though."

Youji blinked, but then just laughed and let his hand fall away. "Right. Sorry. I guess that's just the romantic in me."

"Alright, well. We're going now." Rin said to Sosuke.

"Okay."

Youji took hold of one of Rin's hands anyway and eagerly began leading him over towards the dance floor once again. Rin felt his gut twinge with nervousness. He'd seen people slow dance before but had never done it himself. And was Sosuke just going to stand there and watch them the entire time until Rin got back? The very idea of it made him feel pressured.

They came to a stop a good distance in. Youji turned around so that they were facing each other.

"Come closer to me." Youji said, holding out his arms.

Rin stepped a bit closer, somewhat awkwardly, not knowing how to stand or where to put his arms.

Youji only chuckled at this. "Here. Take your arms," the werewolf took hold of Rin's arms and guided them up to rest and connect around his neck. "Put them like that and…" Rin stiffened once again when he felt one of Youji's broad hands press against the small of his back, pushing his body closer towards Youji's. "Get close to me…"

Rin's body tensed reflexively and a light blush dusted his cheeks. Thier chests pressed together and Youji's heat seeped through Rin's clothes to his body. Rin felt Youji wrap his arms around his waist and come to rest at the small of his back. They started to shift back and forth to the slow rhythm of the song.

"How's that?" Youji's voice was hushed and very close to Rin's ear, sending a shiver down his spine.

"Wh-why am I the one who's like this?" Rin asked in concern to their positions. "Isn't this what the woman's supposed to do?"

Youji stopped their dancing to look at him.

"Are you saying you want to lead?"

Rin choked and looked away, grumbling. "I didn't say that."

Youji chuckled and continued carrying Rin through their dance. "You just seem like you haven't done this before, is all. I thought you wouldn't mind."

Rin decided it was useless trying to save face by disputing the fact that this was his first time slow dancing. It was glaringly obvious that it was, even without Rin having to say so. Why bother?

As strange as it seemed, Rin felt even more self conscious dancing slowly than when he was out there jamming away to bumping fast paced music. For one thing, there were less people, so there was more opportunity for people to gawk at them, and for another thing...It really wasn't like him to be in a situation like this. He felt like a fish out of water in every sense of the phrase.

"It's nice to dance slow like this." He felt the vibrations of Youji's voice rumble through his chest.

"Yeah…"

They turned around in their dance, and Rin's vision appeared blurry for a moment. He blinked his eyes, to try and clear it away, but he was having more and more trouble focusing his vision as they continued on. His head felt heavy and his thoughts seemed sluggish, like he was getting very tired.

Rin accidentally tripped over one of Youji's feet, and couldn't react fast enough to catch himself.

"Whoa." The werewolf caught a hold of Rin and fixed him upright. "What was that just now? You alright?"

"Yeah." Rin breathed and pressed a hand to his forehead. "I just...I'm not sure what's wrong with me."

Youji stopped their dancing, but Rin's head still felt like it was spinning.

"C'mon, why don't we go sit down for a bit?"

That sounded like a good idea to Rin. The redhead let Youji lead him off the dancefloor and over to a black metal staircase on the side of the room that lead up to the infrastructure of metal walkways above the warehouse floor.

Youji set him down on the bottom step gently and then took a seat next to him.

"Well, that was still a pretty good dance." Rin heard Youji say but had some trouble using his words.

"...Yeah. Right, it was a good dance." Rin took a deep breath and leaned against the cold metal railing of the stairs.

"Hey so...uh…" Youji reached into his shirt pocket and produced a beaten up track phone. "I had a good time with you tonight. I was wondering...could I maybe get your digits?" Youji's smile stuck through his corny words.

Rin's brow furrowed, not really following what the werewolf was saying.

"What…?"

"Uhm, I'm asking if I can have your number."

"Oh." Rin pushed his bangs out of his face and looked away. "Uhm. Sorry, but no. It's nothing personal. I had a good time too, I just...didn't come here for that."

"What do you mean you didn't come here for that?" Youji asked. Rin could hear the small twinge of hurt in his voice from being rejected. "You're the one who came over and started talking to me, you know."

"Me and Sosuke came here tonight to try new things for me because…" Rin slammed the brakes on his mouth and clamped it down tight. He was astonished at himself. How could he almost tell a complete stranger something so personal? It really wasn't like him to let things slip up like that. Where the hell was his filter going? "Uh, I mean, nevermind."

But it was too late. Youji's curiosity seemed piqued now. "Try new things? What do you mean?"

"Nothing…" Rin grumbled, only feeling his dizziness get worse.

Youji's purple eyes flicked down to the green bracelet on Rin's wrist. He smiled, as he seemed to realize something.

"Ohhh….I think I get what you mean."

Well shit. Thanks to his slip up, Youji was privy to his secret of being sexually curious. Whatever, it didn't matter. Nothing seemed to matter to Rin at the moment.

"Hey, if that's the sort of thing you're looking for…"

Rin distantly felt Youji's arm snake around his waist and pull him closer so that their sides were touching. Youji's lips murmured against the shell of Rin's ear, voice low and inviting.

"I could show you some things."

"Idiot…" Rin's entire face flushed bright red, but for some reason he couldn't move his body to shove the werewolf away. It was almost as if he were paralyzed. "Get off of me…"

But his voice came out too low, Youji must not have heard him. Rin clenched his eyes shut as he felt soft and warm lips kiss up his jawline, ending just under his ear. A hand slipped under the hem of his shirt and felt over the flat wall of his abs while that naughty mouth started nibbling on the shell of his ear…

Rin's body finally snapped into action, shoving Youji away roughly enough to send him scooting to the other side of the step.

"I said, _get off_ me…" Rin growled, and shot the werewolf a hooded glare containing all the viciousness of a shark thirsting for blood.

Youji shriveled under his gaze.

"Hey, okay!" The wolf said, sheepishly holding up his hands. "There's no reason to get all upset. All you had to do was tell me to stop-"

"Ah, so this is where you were." Came a baritone voice from their front. Sosuke stood in front of them with his hands in his pockets and a dark eyebrow arched. "What are you guys doing over here?"

"Nothing." Rin grumbled. "We're done here. C'mon Sosuke, I think...we should…" Rin went to stand and completely lost his balance. He pitched forward and saw the ground rushing up to meet him, but his body was too sluggish and slow to do anything about it.

"Rin!" He heard Sosuke cry a moment before he collided into something firm but warm. A familiar scent filled his nose; a smell of clean clothes warm from sunshine, a hint of sweat, and just a bit of cologne.

"Mmnnn...Sosuke…" Rin grumbled, fingers pulling on the fabric of his uniform as he struggled to remain upright. Just the simple motion of standing up had Rin's vision blurry and his head swimming. It was hard to see anything straight, and now, to make matters worse, his stomach was starting to feel sick. "I...I don't…"

"Hey, look at me for a second."

Rin felt fingers grip his chin and turn his face upwards. Rin blinked his eyes which brought Sosuke's serious expression into focus.

"Ngh...what? What do you want?" Rin irritably swatted his hand away. Why was everybody fucking touching him tonight!

"Son of a…" Sosuke cursed under his breath and threw a venomous glare Youji's way.

"Hey, don't look at me like that! He was like this before we even sat down!"

"Whatever." Sosuke threw one of Rin's arms over his shoulders and began walking towards the exit. "C'mon. We're going home."

"What are you doing?" Rin squirmed. "Let go of me, you idiot. I can walk my own damn self."

"Like hell you can." Sosuke's grip tightened around Rin's wrist as he continued to fight against him. "You can't even stand up."

"I was just dizzy, that's all." Rin's expression darkened as the butterfly swimmer still refused to let go of him.

"Sosuke." He barked. "I said _I'm fine_."

"And I'm telling you you're not."

"What's your problem!" Rin shouted, punching Sosuke in the side with his free hand. Why the fuck couldn't the guy just understand that Rin wanted to be alone for a few seconds? "Who're you to say how I'm feeling?!"

"Rin- _Rin_!" Sosuke shouted, scuffling with the redhead for a few seconds before grabbing a hold of both of his wrists so he couldn't hit him any more. "Would you get a grip! Do I have to _carry you_ out of here?!"

"No way in hell is that happening." Rin grit his teeth as he fought against his best friend's strength. "Just try it, I dare you!"

* * *

"Sosuke…" Rin growled through clenched teeth. "Put. Me down! _Now_!"

"No." The solitary butterfly swimmer said, completely unaffected by Rin's harsh voice. "You might want to keep it down. It's already midnight."

Rin lay draped over Sosuke's left shoulder like a large, dead fish. He'd already expended the rest of his energy by pounding on Sosuke's back and yelling vulgarities at him earlier. But squirm as he might, he just couldn't break out of the larger male's grasp. After a while, Rin flopped down, pathetically, and let Sosuke carry him, both too tired and too out of it to argue any further.

They had left the warehouse district a while ago and were now back in the residential area. Sosuke came to a stop at the first convenience store he saw and gently let Rin down.

"Wait here a minute."

Too irritable to say anything, Rin just kept quiet as he watched Sosuke walk into the store. The redhead sighed and slid down the brick wall of the building, sinking down on to his backside. He was just so tired from all the events of the day. And his condition certainly wasn't getting any better…

"Here. Drink this."

Rin looked up to find a water bottle hanging close to his face. Sosuke stared down at him with an expression that left him no room for argument.

"Thanks." Rin accepted the water bottle and was unscrewing its cap when another item was shoved in his face followed after the noise of a plastic bag being crinkled. It was a rice ball.

"Eat this too. It'll make you feel better."

"Fine…" Rin relented and took the rice ball, even though he certainly didn't feel like eating.

The two sat in silence for a few moments as Rin took a few swigs of the water and chomped a bite out of his rice ball. Rin's fiery orbs stared at the filling of his rice ball oozing out of the bite mark he'd just made.

"Sosuke…" Came Rin's hoarse voice. His hand tightened around the packaging of his rice ball. "What the hell am I doing…?"

More silence passed between them as Sosuke pondered his answer.

"You shouldn't be so hard on yourself." Sosuke finally said. "I felt the same way when I was going through this a year ago. You're not going to get all the answers right away. So stop looking so depressed about it."

It was times like these that reminded Rin just how well Sosuke understood him, and how unlikely it was that he would ever meet another person who could do it better. Rin continued eating his rice ball, feeling a little bit better.

"I guess you're right."

"We'll talk more about it tomorrow when you're feeling better." Sosuke gulped down the rest of his water, crushed the bottle and tossed it in a bin. "You ready?"

"Yeah." That water and rice ball really did have Rin feeling better. He didn't feel as dizzy any more and his stomach no longer felt queazy. Overly full, but at least not queazy. Rin wondered how Sosuke knew just what to do to fix his symptoms...now that he thought of it, he didn't remember telling Sosuke he felt sick in the first place.

"Can you walk now?"

"Yeah. I think I'll be fine."

The rest of their trip back to their dorm was enveloped in a comfortable silence. When they arrived back to their room around 12:30 that morning, Rin all but collapsed down on to his bunk, not even caring to shower the paint off his body or to get undressed from his disheveled costume.

* * *

"Hey…"

A voice floated to Rin through the void of his sleeping, but he ignored it. He was still so tired. He wanted to remain asleep.

"Hey." Came the voice again and a soft nudge on his shoulder.

Rin groaned and rolled over on to his side. As soon as he did a delectable smell teased his nostrils and made his sleeping stomach churn with hunger. Red eyes peaked open and squinted against bright sunlight coming in through the shades in their dorm room.

Sosuke stood next to him holding a brown paper bag.

"Get up. I got us breakfast."

Every muscle in the swim team captain's body ached as he pushed himself from lying down into a sitting position. He groaned once more just from the simple task of keeping himself upright. He felt as if he'd gone a bit too hard at the gym the previous day, but didn't remember going there before…

Looking down, Rin saw he was still wearing the crumpled police officer costume from last night and felt the dry princess paint crusted underneath. That's when the events of the previous night came flooding back to him and he groaned for an entirely different reason.

The paper bag crinkled as Sosuke tore it open and removed two lumps wrapped in clean white paper.

"How are you feeling?" He asked, handing one of the lumps to Rin.

Rin's head ached, feeling like it was buried in sand, and his breath tasted like death. His stomach felt a cross between viciously hungry and mildly sick.

"Fine, I guess." His voice sounded like gravel as he accepted the neatly wrapped package. It was warm and smelled delicious. Unwrapping it proved the item to be a juicy egg and cheese sandwich.

"Good to hear." Sosuke pulled out the rollaway chair at the desk and sat down to eat his own sandwich and cracked open bottle of soda.

The two ate in silence for the most part, but Rin was anything but relaxed. He knew what was coming. If Sosuke thought he could catch him off guard a third time by being all nice and waking him up with breakfast then he was dead wrong. Rin, his mind still sluggish with sleep, quickly tried to recall all the things that had happened the night before.

Sosuke crumpled the white packaging paper after taking the final bite of his sandwich and Rin subsequently felt his stomach sink.

"Alright. So," Sosuke turned the chair about so that he could rest his upper body over the back of it. "Start talking: what happened last night?"

"A lot of stuff…" He sighed.

"Why don't you start with telling me about that guy?"

Rin felt his gut wrench and his cheeks sting in embarrassment. Then an instant later he felt his embarrassment give way to frustration as he remembered all the things that mangy mongrel did to him...and how he hadn't really done anything about it. Rin clenched his teeth _..._ For crying out loud, he'd just woken up and eaten breakfast and he was already getting to be in a bad mood.

"Jeez...do we _have_ to talk about this now?"

"Yes, we do, actually. Because if not you'll just keep blowing me off until I back you into a corner."

Rin shot his friend a half lidded glare but had to concede that in a way he was right. Rin was beginning to realize that about himself: that he had a tendency to avoid this specific type of conversation. Conversations about his sexual wants and identity.

"Fine…" he sighed. "After we talked for a bit we went to dance and…" Rin's fingers clenched around the wrapper to his sandwich.

"And?"

"He touched me…" His cheeks heated with a blush. Him and Sosuke had had these types of talks a couple times now but it still wasn't any easier for Rin to talk about stuff like this with him. He just wasn't used to talking about such things in general and the fact that he was talking about it with Sosuke made it even weirder.

But like last time, Sosuke didn't seem to feel nearly as uncomfortable.

"What do you mean?"

Rin ran his fingers through his hair and let out a slow breath through his nose. He explained everything in detail: about what happened on the dance floor, how he saw Youji dancing and got attracted to him, put on a teasing show of his own and as a result got groped from behind. He also told Sosuke about their time slow dancing and everything that happened before he found them together on the stairs.

"I have no idea what my problem was." Rin growled. "But if I had been in my right mind when he did that to me…" He let his sentence trail off menacingly.

"You were drunk."

The words hit Rin like a slap to the face.

"...What?!"

"Did the punch have a burning flavor?"

Rin blinked. "How did...you know that?" The redhead didn't remember seeing Sosuke drink any of the punch.

"Happens all the time at parties. Someone must have dumped a decent sized bottle of vodka in there. Your breath was reeking of it when I found you last night."

"And you didn't think to warn me about stuff like that before we went in?"

Sosuke's brow darkened. "So it's my fault you got hammered?"

"I was not _hammered_!" Rin growled. Talk about adding insult to injury. First he had to relive the embarrassment of what happened the night before, and now to find out that he was a lightweight that couldn't even hold down a drink? The redhead sighed and passed a hand over his face.

"We're getting off topic." For once, Rin actually deflected the conversation back towards the matter he didn't normally want to talk about.

"Ah, right. So, did you figure anything out?"

"Well, I haven't really had time to think about it. All this only happened just last night…" A pregnant pause enveloped the two as Rin stared down at the remaining half of his sandwich, reflecting upon the memories as well as the emotions and the urges that came with them.

"But even so, even only having this short amount of time to think about things, I think I can safely say that I did figure something out about myself."

"Alright then. Out with it."

"Well…" Rin's cheeks heated with a blush as he recalled the image of Youji dancing sensually one the dance floor, feeling himself up and down. "I think I can say that...I'm open to the idea being interested in guys."

"Okay." Sosuke's tone encouraged Rin to continue.

"But more importantly, as embarrassing as it was to have that shit happen to me, it did make me realize something else about myself."

"You're talking about when he kissed you?"

Rin's brow furrowed and his lip curled in distaste. "Yeah. As much as I don't like that it happened...it…it made me realize that I can't do those sorts of things with someone I don't know. I realized that I don't think I'd be able to tell if I'm truly interested in doing those sorts of things with another guy if I do that stuff with some random person."

"Huh…"

Sosuke pondered his best friend's information with a furrowed brow.

"So...you're thinking that you might like guys…"

"Yeah."

"But looking at stuff does nothing for you?"

"Right."

"And experimenting with a person doesn't mean anything either unless you know them very well?"

"Mmn...yeah…" Rin started to put all the information together like Sosuke had. From a logical process of thinking, it would make sense if Rin tried to experiment with someone, a guy, that he knew well. Or at least well enough that he could confide in him with confidence. But at the same time, that guy would also have to have a taste for guys as well to not reject Rin outright.

His red eyes flickered as his mind went through the brief catalogue of people he knew: guys on the swim team, classmates. He realized he didn't know hardly anyone that fit the bill...except for one person. The realization caused a creeping type of embarrassment that turned from mild to stifling. The huge elephant in the room only grew larger with each passing second of silence that went between them. Rin wondered if Sosuke was silent because he realized it too, and just didn't want to say anything, or if he was only thinking and didn't even realize it. Rin was severely hoping for the latter.

After a while Sosuke cleared his throat to break the silence. He scratched the back of his neck and averted his cool blue eyes. Rin could have swore he saw a very light flush on the tops of Sosuke's cheek bones.

 _Oh god no, Sosuke,_ Rin inwardly pleaded. _Don't say it, please don't make this awkward-_

"What if _we_ tried doing stuff together?"

* * *

 **Heeeeeeeeeey guuuys. Sorry it took me forever and a day to write this. But I'm guessing you can forgive me seeing as how a whole bunch of goodies happened. So, if you haven't noticed, I'm taking things really slow with Rin and Sosuke, because that's the only way I see things working between them. I wanted to focus on the love aspect of this story first before getting to all the stuff that we want to see because I think that makes them a stronger couple, makes them stronger as characters and overall just makes for a better story. So that's why, at the end of chapter three, we're just getting to this point of them** _ **talking**_ **about trying stuff together. I know I write too much and for too long, but thank you for sticking with this story. Thanks guys!**

 **Ahahahaah! omg but the disney princess part tho! I'm so glad I thought of that, I struggled for a good thirty mins between me and my friends trying to decide which disney princess Rin should be xD Jasmine's my favorite personally but we started with Ariel and had to come back to Ariel. It only made sense.**

 **Comments always give me determination to keep writing, thank you for those who comment!**

 **Bye for now :)**

 **Random Shorts~***

* * *

"Sosuke…" Came Rin's hoarse voice. His hand tightened around the packaging of his rice ball. "What the hell am I doing…?"

"Uhmmm…" Sosuke paused and then said very slowly. "You're eating a rice ball, Rin."

Rin scowled and shot his friend a death glare.

"Would you just shut up?"

* * *

"Fine…" he sighed. "After we talked for a bit we went to dance and…" Rin's fingers clenched around the wrapper to his sandwich.

"And?"

"He touched me…" Rin's cheeks heated with a blush.

Sosuke placed a blank, undecorated stuffed doll on the table between them. It looked to be in the shape and the size of a small child.

"Tell us where he touched you, son."

Rin's eye brows shot up at this.

"You don't have to say it if it's too painful for you. You can just point if that works."

The solitary butterfly swimmer procured a box of tissues from the same place he pulled the doll from and slid it across the table towards Rin.

"Take your time."

"What the hell is this?" Rin shouted. "Law and Order special victim's unit?!"


	4. Fanning the Cinders

***~Chapter Four~***

 **Fanning the Cinders**

 ***Just wanna say that pretty much this entire chapter was sired by Migoto Nami and was written by me. I was having a hard time and she really helped me out. So ya, go check out her stuff...and stuff.**

* * *

"Oi. Quit messing around and come kill this guy." The brunette's tone was flat, nearly monotonous.

"I'm trying." Rin frowned. "I can't move, I'm stuck behind this stupid pile of rocks."

Rin's character twitched every which way on the screen as she tried to free herself from the glitched position inside a pile of rubble. Meanwhile Sosuke's character was being pursued by a hulking armored skeleton warrior. He was dangerously low on health and all out of potions. His death would mean that they would have to start the area all over again and lose all the loot they picked up.

"It's fine. I'll just die and we'll start over."

"Don't even think about it." Rin warned. "I picked up an awesome crossbow back there and I'm not losing it because you want to half-ass things."

Sosuke's hand reached over to Rin's controller and pressed the start button, bringing the pause menu up on screen.

Rin's brow furrowed deeper. "What're you…?"

"Rin." Sosuke's teal eyes were unwavering as they connected with red. "Why don't we try doing something now?"

His eyes rounded with surprise and a moment later he felt his cheeks sting. Was Sosuke asking what Rin thought he was asking?

"...what do you mean?"

"You know what I mean." Sosuke said, his tone and expression serious. "I'm saying we should try doing something together."

The redhead's stomach lurched and his cheeks flushed with warmth. He averted his gaze to the hardwood floor below and anxiously rubbed his thumbs against his controller.

"I guess so…" His tone came out sounding muffled and indigent but he didn't mean it to. He felt his body tense up as a sort of silence elapsed between them. But he shook off the feeling and turned to face his best friend with a focused expression.

"Alright…" He swallowed and forced himself to meet Sosuke's gaze. "What did you have in mind?"

Rin resolved that he wouldn't shy away. After all, the last time he and Sosuke talked about this a few days ago, he did agree to accept his help…

* * *

"What if _we_ tried doing stuff together?"

Rin was speechless. He'd been expecting the question and yet it had still managed to catch him off guard, completely rendering his mind as a blank slate.

He forced his mouth to start moving, trying to give the butterfly swimmer an answer he didn't have. "Sosuke…you're not serious, are you?"

"I am." Nothing about Sosuke's tone or his expression betrayed anything about what he might be feeling. He appeared nearly stoic as always, except for his dark brow which was set with a hint of seriousness. "I wouldn't joke about something like that."

"Of course you wouldn't, but still, I…" Rin looked anywhere but at Sosuke and scratched the back of his neck.

"You said it yourself: You think you have urges for guys, but won't know unless you try things out with someone you know. Who else do you know that fits the bill?"

Rin remained silent, not really wanting to entertain the thought.

"Would you prefer Momo?"

Rin drew back as if someone had just hit him. "What? No-!"

"Then Ai?"

Rin's brow darkened as his fiery orbs met with frosty teal. "Do you hear yourself right now? You're not making any sense."

"Who else do you know well enough then?"

Rin saw Sosuke's point, and indeed, had already arrived at the same conclusion even before his solemn friend had said it. Such knowledge was making it even more difficult to argue with him. Rin remained quiet, not really sure how to answer his best friend.

"I'm not saying we have to take things far." The butterfly swimmer said while scratching the back of his head. "I mostly meant like holding hands and stuff."

"Sosuke…" The embarrassment of the whole situation had Rin struggling for his words. "I'm sorry, but I don't think-"

"I don't expect you to answer me right now, and I don't want you to either." The brunette stood up from the roll-away desk chair and stuffed his hands in his short's pockets. "Just promise me you'll give it some honest thought before you say yes or no. Got it?"

Rin knew what he wanted to say, but something about the way Sosuke seemed so adamant about the whole thing had him hesitate. At the very least, the redhead felt that he should humor Sosuke's wishes if only for politeness sake.

"Aaahh...sure, I will."

"Alright." The bigger of the two males went over to the door and slipped on his shoes. "I'm going out for a bit. Be back later." He cast one last glance back at Rin before opening the door. "See ya." And then closed it behind him.

* * *

"Nitori, Aiichiro." Rin's voice called out in a drone-like fashion.

"Hai!"

"Onodera, Ritsu."

His other members answered with much the same level of energy as Rin read down the line taking attendance. The early summer sun beat down harshly on the tops of everyone's heads and the blistering heat radiating from the black top parking lot and from the stinky, loud bus behind their captain certainly wasn't making things any easier on them. Rin shared the same sentiments with his members and tried to go through the roster as quickly as possible. He wanted to dive into that cold pool at the place they were going to just as badly as everyone else did.

"Alright. Everyone's here. You guys can head on the bus now."

"Ah-wait a moment, Rin-Senpai!" Nitori called out, raising his hand like a good little egg. "You haven't told us where we're going or why…"

"Ah? I thought I did…" He murmured while brushing some hair from his face. "Well anyways, we're all heading to Iwatobi for a joint practice today. I figure you guys can get some experience swimming with other people who are on our level. Let's get a move on. I don't want to be late."

"Yes, sir!" They all cried and promptly boarded the bus.

About thirty minutes later found the whole of the Samezuka swim team dressed and standing around the glistening pool at Iwatobi high school.

Almost immediately a perky and petite blonde teenager bounced over to Rin who fronted the group of his team that he was leading from the locker rooms.

"Rin-chan! You're here!"

"Hey, Nagisa. We're here for the joint practice today."

The blonde peeked over Rin's shoulder and let out a chuckle. "And you brought everybody this time! Even Ai-chan!"

"Of course I'd come. I'm part of the swim team after all..." Rin heard his underclassman mumble. "And I'd prefer if you didn't call me Ai-cha-".

Not noticing (or perhaps not caring about) Nitori's comment, Nagisa spun around on his heel and shouted to a very built young man doing the backstroke in the pool.

"Mako-chan! Rin-chan and his team are here!"

After completing his touch on the other end of the pool, the young man stood up in the water and removed his black swimming cap to reveal a full head of honey brown hair that was slicked down flat to his head, completely drenched. After catching his breath for just a few seconds, he climbed out of the pool. The water ran off his half naked body in droplets zigzagging over his taut chest and abs. A smile graced his full lips as he approached the captain of the Samezuka swim team that lit up his entire face and made his emerald eyes shimmer.

"Rin. You're here already? I didn't think you'd be here so soon." The male said, brushing his wet brown bangs out of his eyes.

Rin arched his brow but felt a corner of his mouth twitch upwards despite himself.

"C'mon. You knew what time I'd be here. You guys can't continue to be so carefree all the time."

The brunette chuckled, scratching the back of his head sheepishly.

"Ah, by the way," Rin went to stand beside the larger male. "I don't think I've introduced you to my team yet. Everyone, this is Makoto Tachibana. He's the captain of the Iwatobi swim team. Learn what you can from him during our practice today."

Rin's team responded heartily to his orders while Makoto gave a subtle yet polite bow.

"Alright. Everyone begin with your warm-ups and then we'll get started."

The team gave noises of affirmation and then moved to their respective positions some ways away to begin their stretching. Among the crowd, Rin's fiery irises accidently connected with a certain pair of teal ones. His and Sosuke's gazes connecting sent a jolt of awkwardness through him, causing his stomach to lurch reflexively. He looked away before he could help himself, but when he looked back again he saw Sosuke involved with helping Momo stretch. As usual, nothing about Sosuke's expression gave away what the solitary brunette might be thinking or feeling.

Rin ran his fingers through his hair and glared off in the direction of the water.

 _The hell is wrong with me...?_ _Playing glancing games like this..._ Rin didn't believe in beating around the bush most of the time, or at least when things came to his own problems. But somehow this particular problem of his was something he did not know how to deal with. And especially now since Sosuke was involved…

Rin recalled bits of their conversation as his red irises drifted around the pool, falling on each one of the Iwatobi swim members.

 _Ahhh...that's right._ He remembered now that back when he and Sosuke were half seriously talking about other candidates to try new things with they didn't even consider any of his friends from Iwatobi. Rin supposed that he knew Haru, Makoto and Nagisa well enough. Rei was a nice person, but Rin could hardly say he knew him very well.

Rin gave it some serious thought for a moment. Would he consider doing those sorts of things with Nagisa? His lip wrinkled and he shook his head. No way. That was something he just could not picture. Then what about Haru? Rin imagined approaching Haru about the subject and simply couldn't see the solitary swimmer agreeing to it. Haru didn't seem romantically interested in anything except water, weirdly enough. Besides, thinking of that outcome made him feel just as uncomfortable as when he tried to imagine things with Sosuke...Then Makoto?

Rin rubbed at his eyes to hide the deep furrowing of his brow and the slight blush going across his cheeks. _I need to stop thinking about things like this and get a grip_. _This is just making things too weird_.

"Rin-san!" A jubilant voice pulled the redhead's attention back to the present. A handsome-looking young man with dark purplish hair stood in front of him smiling with his hands placed on his hips. His amethyst orbs which rested behind bright red frames were set with an unspoken challenge. "Good afternoon!"

"Ah, Rei." Rin mumbled, trying to recede from his awkward thoughts. "What's up?"

"I wanted to officially extend a challenge to you in a race swimming butterfly style!" Rei pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose with a smile. "What do you say? I think it would be an excellent opportunity for us to develop our butterfly technique!"

"Oh, uh. Sure. But, not right now..."

The other male's smile fell and his brow pulled upwards in a slightly concerned expression. "Turning down a challenge...? That's very weird to be hearing from you, Rin-san."

"Uh, I only meant I haven't done my warm-ups yet." Rin stuffed his hands in his pockets and looked away. "I just need to do my stretches, that's all."

Rei's face brightened once again with a smile, all worry fading away from Rin's words.

"Oh, yes! How foolish of me to have not realized! Very well," the young man said pushing up his glasses once more. "Take as much time as you need to properly warm-up. I will be ready for yo-"

"Aaah, careful, Rei-chan!" Came a cute voice attempting to be serious down near the male's hip. "There's a troublesome crab scuttling about that likes to pinch men's underwear!"

"H-huh?! Wh-what do you-!"

Rei's swimming jammers started being pulled down his hip, exposing his pale skin underneath. The poor butterfly failed to notice anything was happening until both of his fair butt cheeks jiggled out over the top of his swim suit, glistening in the sun.

"What in the world!"

Rei clutched at his garments to pull them back up. The red hue on his face was enough to rival the color of his glasses. Spinning around revealed the culprit, Nagisa, crouched on the ground holding an extendo-arm tool that had a pinching mechanism on the far end of it. The blonde gave an angelic smile and pulled the trigger a few more times which made the two fingers open and close on the other end of it.

"Run away, Rei-chan. Crabby-chan wants more of your cheeks."

"N-Nagisa-kun stop this!"

A chase ensued that involved Nagisa rapidly pinching the extendo-arm inches from Rei's butt and Rei protectively covering his cheeks while screaming.

Rin watched the whole spectacle with half lidded eyes and sighed.

"I'm not in the mood to deal with this right now..."

"You feeling okay, Onii-chan? What's wrong?" Came a familiar voice from Rin's left.

A petite, redheaded girl stood next to Rin looking up at him with expectant eyes which were an identical shade of red to his own. Likewise, her long red hair which was pulled back into a ponytail borrowed from the same color as his. The girl was Gou, his younger sister.

Rin stiffened from the question. Was it really so easy to tell that something was bothering him today?

"What are you talking about?" He asked, trying to play it off. "Nothing's wrong."

"Nnnnn..." Gou began in a chastising tone. "I know you better than that. I can tell when something is bothering you."

"I'm telling you nothing's wrong." He whined, hoping with one last attempt to shake her off.

There was a brief pause that was filled with Nagisa's laughter and Rei's screaming. Then silence came after there was a huge splash from the pool.

"...Did you and Sosuke-kun get into another fight?"

Rin sighed as he realized that nothing he could say would deter his doting sister. Red orbs searched across the way and came to rest on the shoulders of a particularly familiar brunette.

"Not exactly..."

Gou remained silent, urging her brother to continue.

"Gou..." Rin began hesitantly. "...I've been...lately I've been...having second thoughts about what I want..."

"Hnn? What you want?"

"Yeah."

Her red brows shot upwards in concern. "You mean...what you want to do with your future?"

Rin clenched a fist at his side.

"Yeah, I guess that's what I mean."

"Well..." Gou was quiet for a moment, hugging her ubiquitous clipboard to her chest while she pondered her answer.

"I know you were having thoughts about going abroad, and I can understand how that would feel scary. It's a big investment and it still might not work out...but if it's one thing I know about you it's you don't let insecurities like that get in your way. My Onii-chan went to a foreign country where he couldn't even speak or read the language and held his own just fine!" Gou smiled clenching a fist in front of herself.

"I guess what I'm trying to say is maybe things won't end up going as well as you hoped, but at the same time they might turn out better than you imagine. You will never know unless you give it an honest try. And also, for better or for worse, the experience is still an experience to help round you as a person. That's what I think, anyway."

"Hnnn..." Fiery orbs jumped to the far end of the pool where all the team members had started lining up for practice, having finally finished their warm-ups.

"Yeah, I see what you're saying..."

Rin mulled over his sister's words for a few moments, then turned and gave her a reassuring half-smile.

"That really helped me. Thanks, Gou."

The girl's eyes rounded in surprise, but then she too smiled and dipped her head in a nod. "Nnn!"

Just then, a very high-pitched and excited voice cut through the air from across the pool.

"Ahaha ha hah, Gooooouu-saaaan!" Momo waved to Rin's younger sister with sparkles dancing around his head.

Rin arched his brow. "It looks like you have someone asking for you."

Gou shrunk back, hugging her clipboard even tighter. "I might just stay over here today..."

Rin gave a toothy smile and chuckled. "I can't blame you there. Oi, Rei!" He called out and removed his jacket. "You ready? Let's get that race started!"

After the race the group's practice went on until the sky was orange and the night-time birds started chirping.

"It's about time to wrap up." Rin called out to his men. "Let's head out to the showers."

Rin and everyone headed over to the showers beside the pool to rinse the chemicals from the water off their bodies. They made quick work of it and soon just about everyone had headed back into the locker room.

"Hey, Sosuke," Rin called after his friend before he could leave with everyone else. "Hold on a second."

Sosuke paused as the rest of the swim team walked away.

"What's up?"

Rin knew what he wanted to say, but the subject matter made it difficult for him to formulate his thoughts into sentences.

"I thought about what you said earlier..."

The look that registered on Sosuke's face said he hadn't expected Rin to bring the subject up.

"And...I've decided...that I want to give it a try."

Sosuke's brows shot upwards and his mouth popped open. Then, a second later his expression was serious again, his blue gaze turning firm.

"You're sure about this?"

"Yeah..." Rin looked towards the setting sun in the orange sky. "I gave it some thought like you said, and I realized nothing's going to change if I don't take action." He closed his eyes, unable to proceed while looking at Sosuke. "I was so hung up on the fact that it's...it's _you_ ," Rin felt his cheeks sting as he said the words. "But just as long as you're not weirded out about it, I guess there's no reason for me to be so prude." Fiery red orbs opened and slid in their sockets to connect with teal. "Right?"

"Ah, Yeah..."

"Oi, c'mon." Rin playfully punched Sosuke's arm with a grouchy expression. "Quit making that face. It's not like I'm sentencing you to death or something."

"I know, it's just..." Sosuke rubbed his arm. "I expected you to say no, is all."

Rin opened his mouth but then closed it and scratched the back of his neck. "Yeah, sorry I almost answered too quickly earlier."

"Don't worry about it. C'mon. We should go. Everyone's waiting for you."

"Ah, right."

The swim team captain said his goodbyes to the Iwatobi family and gave an especially warm smile to his sister.

"Gou." He called before she could walk off. "Thanks for earlier."

The girl smiled and nodded her head. "Any time."

* * *

...Which was how he found himself in his current predicament, trying not to fidget under Sosuke's seemingly unmovable, blue gaze.

"Relax, I don't want to do anything weird." Sosuke said, his brow furrowing.

Rin arched a red brow as he bit back the words, _define 'weird'._ This whole idea was already weird to him as far as Rin was concerned.

"Here." Sosuke held out both his hands palm-side up. "Hold my hands."

"Hold your...hands?"

"Yeah, that's simple enough, isn't it?"

"Yeah, but..." _Is this really going to help me figure out what satisfies me?_

"Look, it's nothing erotic," Sosuke said as if he were reading Rin's thoughts, much to the redhead's dismay. "But we have to start somewhere, right?"

Sosuke still held his hands out to Rin in offering, his steady blue eyes never wavering from red.

Rin swallowed as his orbs dropped down to look at the palms of the larger butterfly swimmer. Taking them would mean that he would start this whole process with Sosuke. There was no telling how far it would go, but the idea of starting still made Rin feel anxious all the same.

 _Snap out of it_ , he chastised himself. These were only Sosuke's hands, the hands of his best friend. There was no reason to be scared or have any reservations. _I said I would do this. There's no backing out now._

"Idiot...I know that..."

Rin finally slipped his hands into Sosuke's palms and squeezed his fingers. His skin was pleasantly cool to the touch. His hands felt soft in some places yet rough in others. Rin supposed the soft parts came from his comfortable life during school, and the rough parts came from working hard during the summer helping his Dad with his construction business. Those thoughts made Rin realize just how much he knew about the solitary brunette sitting across from him, more than anyone should know. They had been friends for so long, there was hardly an aspect of Sosuke's life that he didn't know about...

...or so he had thought.

Remembering that talk they'd had between them a couple weeks ago reminded Rin that while he had an intimate understanding about how the guy worked, about his family and his personal life, there was also a lot about Sosuke that he didn't know. Even though he and Sosuke had been friends for years, there were almost just as many years of them being apart and not talking...and Rin felt that was mostly his fault.

"Rin, what's wrong?"

A low baritone voice sounded in front of him, pulling Rin back to the present. He made a small startled noise as he hadn't realized how far he'd drifted until Sosuke had said something. Looking up revealed slightly concerned teal eyes looking at him.

Rin's hold on Sosuke's hands tightened, just barely enough to be noticeable.

"Nothing's wrong..."

More silence passed between them. Rin tried to quiet his restless thoughts and focus on the moment and what he was doing with Sosuke. Suddenly, a soft chuckle rumbled in Sosuke's chest.

"This reminds me of that one time..."

Rin arched his brow. "What, us holding hands like this?"

"Yeah. Don't you remember?"

Rin's brow furrowed as he wondered what on earth Sosuke might be talking about. The redhead wracked his collection of memories. It couldn't have been anything recent. Then from when they were kids...?

Suddenly a light went on in Rin's head as the memory came flashing back to him.

"Oh, that!" He chuckled. "Yeah, I remember. You mean that time we went shopping with my mom at the department store and Gou got lost, right? She was just a toddler back then." Rin's eyes grew warm as he reflected on the time passed.

"My mom was pretty worried, and because of that I started to get scared too..." Rin's grip tightened around Sosuke's fingers reflexively.

"Your mom had us wait with the manager while she and security looked around the store." Sosuke continued.

"You started crying and said, _what if they don't find her? What if somebody stole my baby sister?_ "

Rin's lips pursed into a pout. "Hey, c'mon. We don't have to talk about that part, you know..."

"Then, I took your hand..." Sosuke's fingers shifted in Rin's hand, threading their warm fingers together. The small gesture sent a flush of warmth through the redhead's entire body that reached all the way up to his cheeks. "And I told you not to worry, that they would find her. I said, _I'll stay here with you as long as you need me. I won't go anywhere. So you can stop crying now._ "

Sosuke's blue eyes looked distant and glassy as he stared down at their hands joining together. He smoothed the rough pads of his thumbs over the backs of Rin's hands in a tender back and forth motion.

Rin's face heated up as he felt some wetness pool at the corners of his eyes.

"Sosuke..."

Sosuke held their hands together for a moment longer and then gently released them. Rin's fingers suddenly felt so cold without the presence of Sosuke's hands flush up against his.

"That's enough for today."

Sosuke picked his controller back up and shifted in his seat to face the tv again.

"I've got a plan to get us out of this. Just follow my lead."

"Uh...sure..." Rin picked up his own controler and begrudgingly turned back towards the tv and unpaused the game. And so, just like that, their first lesson had ended just as abruptly and out-of-no-where as it had started.

* * *

The next day found the red headed captain in front of the closed door to Nitori and Momo's dorm room. It was later in the evening, after classes and practice had been done with.

Rin raised his knuckle and knocked on the door.

"Ai. Momo. It's me, can I come in?"

 _That's weird_ , Rin thought to himself, _usually their door's always open_.

"Ah! W-wait just a second, Rin-senpai!" Came Nitori's frazzled voice from the other side. "Momo-kun is-"

"PYUNSUKE!" Momo's voice exploded through pitiful sobs. "Where did you go, Pyunsuke?! Wahahah!"

"Eeeh...s-sorry senpai, Momo-kun's beetle got out of his cage. We're trying to find him now. Could you come back in a few minutes?"

Rin clicked his tongue and shook his head. "You shouldn't even have something like that in the dorms in the first place..." He muttered. "Oi, Momo. Open up the door just a little. I want to give you-"

"No, Rin-senpai!" He heard the other redhead cry as someone threw their body up against the door, effectively barring it. "You can't open this door even a little bit! What if Pyunsuke gets out?!"

A small growl of irritation rumbled in the captain's throat.

"Well hurry up and find him already. I need to talk to you."

Usually Rin would have come back later, but as it was he kept forgetting to talk to Momo about this certain thing and wanted to do it now while they both had time.

"Alright!" Nitori chimed. "We'll hurry!"

Rin stood staring at the wooden barrier that separated him from his classmates with half lidded red eyes while he listened to the ruckus they made looking for Momo's bug. Pretty soon their voices and rustling faded away as Rin's thoughts started to preoccupy himself.

His knuckles still buzzed from rapping them against the hard door. The sensation drew Rin's restless thoughts down to that part of his body and made him think of what had transpired between him and his best friend the day before.

Oddly enough the experience hadn't been...as awkward or as fruitless as he initially thought it would have been. As a matter of fact, when Rin reflected on it, he actually felt a little disappointed that the session hadn't lasted longer. Dare he say...

...it felt...nice to hold Sosuke's hands. He wasn't sure if it was weird for him to be thinking that about his best friend, and didn't really know if he liked the experience in _that_ sort of way. Just as he was starting to have reservations about how he should feel or if it was weird because of the fact it was Sosuke, he consciously stopped himself. Rin reminded himself not to get hung up on the fact that the person he was doing these things with was his best friend, and certainly not to care about the fact that he was a guy. If he liked it, then he liked it. There really wasn't any need to reflect on his feelings of the matter further.

Finally, the door to the dorm room opened to reveal a defeated looking Nitori and a rejoicing Momo snuggling a jar with a stag beetle inside of it.

"Sorry about that Senpai…" Nitori sighed. "Momo-kun's beetle is okay after all."

"What a relief." Rin drawled in a flat tone. "Oi, Momo." The redhead called over Nitori's shoulder. "Put your bug down and come here a minute. I have to talk to you."

"Ahaha, okay!" The bubbly underclassman bounced up from his position on the floor and gently placed Pyunsuke on their desk. It was a wonder how anyone could go from desperately upset to blissfully happy in a matter of fifteen minutes, Rin thought. He wondered how Nitori constantly put up with the other redhead's mood swings. It must have been exhausting for the both of them.

"Yes? What is it, Rin-senpai?"

"Here." Rin handed him a white envelope that had the words _first place prize_ written on it. He watched as Momo opened up the envelope and saw his expression shift from curiosity to shock.

"Th-these are two passes to Disney World in Tokyo!" Momo exclaimed, prompting Nitori to come and look over his shoulder. "Senpai, why are you giving these to me?!"

"Me and Sosuke won them when we went to a party a while ago, but…" He scratched the back of his neck and averted his gaze down the hallway. "It's for a couples trip so it wouldn't really make sense for us to go together. I figured you might be able to use them better."

"No way! You're serious?! Waahoooo!" Momo cried and skipped down the hallway holding the passes over his head. "Disney world, Disney world, Disneeeeeey wooorld, ahaha!"

"Oi, keep it down." His captain mumbled, knowing his pleas would fall on deaf ears.

"Rin-senpai! Do you think Mickey-chan and Minnie-chan will be there?! Ah! What about Buzz Lightyear and Woody-!" Suddenly, Momo's golden eyes went blank and he blushed. "...what if I get meet Cinderella-sama?"

Rin was beginning to wonder if perhaps bestowing Momo with these passes was a bad idea…

"But, Rin-senpai…" Nitori spoke up. "There's no one that you would want to take with you? Eh! N-not to be nosey!" He held up his hands defensively. "I-I only meant that, it's such a shame for you to miss out on it just because…"

"I don't really know anyone I could ask. I mean, it's a _couple's trip_ …" Rin averted his eyes down the hallway again and sighed. "I think it would just be too weird to ask anybody to go with me. Besides, I don't really know that much about Disney."

"And...Yamazaki-senpai was okay with you just giving them to Momo-kun?"

"He...didn't seem like he cared when I asked him."

"Rin-senpai!" Momo was up in Rin's face again. "Do you think if I asked Gou-san to come with me that she might say yes?"

The corners of Rin's mouth pulled downwards and he arched a brow. "How should I know? You should ask her yourself." He sighed and stuffed his hands into his pockets.

"I'm not going to stop her from going if she says yes...but you better remember this," A visible shiver ran down Momo's body as Rin connected a searing red glare into his golden gaze. "You _better_ be a gentleman to her, you got that?"

"Gggh!" For a moment, all Momo could do was quiver. "I would never do anything to disrespect Gou-san! Stop making such a scary face at me!"

"Good. Well then, I hope you enjoy your time-"

"Gah! Wait just a second, senpai!" Momo cried and then disappeared into his room. A moment later he reappeared holding what looked to be a board game that hadn't been opened yet. The title of it was printed in big English letters, but even with his experience of reading the language Rin still had trouble pronouncing the name.

"Qwua...Qwir...Qwirkle?"

"Me and my Onii-chan went shopping the other day and I bought this new board game. We should all play it together sometime!"

"Sure, that sounds like it'd be fun." Rin smiled.

"Ah! I'd like to play too!" Nitori chimed in from the background.

"The box says that the game is better with four people, so let's invite Yamazaki-senpai too!"

"Sounds good to me. Bring it over to our room and we'll all play sometime this weekend after practice."

"Yeah!"

"Okay. Get some rest, you guys. And no more yelling." Rin said, casting a glance at Momo. With that, he left the two in their doorway with a wave.

"Aah! Thank you so much, Rin-senpai! I'll never forget your kindness!"

"I said no more yelling…"

When Rin got back to his dorm room he found Sosuke over by his school bag searching for something.

"What are you up to?" Rin asked as he closed the door behind him.

"I rented a movie from the machine today. I figured we could watch it."

"Hnn? A movie? What is it?"

Sosuke, having found what he was looking for, stood up and showed Rin a DvD box with a picture of a black dinosaur skeleton contrasted against a red background.

" _Jurassic...Park_?" Rin read the English words carefully. He remembered hearing about this film during his stay in Australia but he had never gotten around to watching it. "You seriously want to watch this?"

"Yeah. Seems interesting. You're not scared, are you?" Sosuke teased his friend with a smirk.

"Tch, idiot." Rin muttered, stepping around him and flopping down on to the bottom bunk. "That's not what I meant. This movie was made in English. How are you supposed to follow along?"

"This version has Japanese voice-overs. I'll be fine."

"Fine then. Put it in already."

Sosuke pressed a button on the console and dropped the DvD in the tray once it popped out. The movie began to play while Sosuke shut off the light and crawled on to the bottom bunk with Rin. They would often watch stuff or play video games together while sitting next to each other on Rin's bed, so the situation shouldn't have been weird.

It shouldn't have been...yet Rin found himself feeling a bit nervous about how close they were.

They both sat with their backs pressed against the wall with about only a foot of space between them. As much as Rin tried to focus on the movie, every now and then his attention would be brought back to the pocket of space between their bodies when Sosuke would shift or clear his throat. At one point Rin glanced down and saw one of Sosuke's hands resting on the bed beside him. It would have been so easy to reach out and slip his fingers into those cool palms that were both rough and gentle at the same time. To feel that sort of special connection with him again. Rin's hand burned with the urge to do so, and for a fraction of a second he made an action to do it...but then just as quickly stuffed his own hand in his pocket and glared back at the tv screen, pretending to have never looked down in the first place.

* * *

It was Saturday evening and all of the physical activities had concluded for the day. The air was warm and stagnant while sounds of cicadas and crickets floated in through the open slider door. Earlier that evening Rin, Sosuke, Momo and Nitori had gone down to the local convenience store to grab their favorite choice of ice cream: Sosuke and Rin munched on rootbeer popsicles, Nitori savored a fruit sherbet cup, meanwhile Momo lapped a drooping ninja turtle character pop that had gumballs for eyes. Though the boys had tried their best with their tactics to remain cool, the stillness of the air and the humidity made the atmosphere nearly stifling. There wasn't a breeze to be had on this particular evening, so instead the four occupants of the room had opted to install a fan on the desk.

The four said occupants were all currently sitting on the floor of the swim team captain's dorm room. In the center of their group was a criss-crossing of game pieces that looked almost like dominos but were more square in their appearance and had only a single shape printed on them.

Rin's red eyes shifted over the assortment of pieces all lined up in their patterns, trying to figure out what action would earn him the most points. Rin tried his best to maintain a serious face, but as much as he didn't want to admit it...he had only half an idea what he was doing.

"I know you have the yellow circle, Sosuke." Rin shot his best friend a hooded glare. "You can drop the act."

Sosuke's expression didn't budge an inch. As always, the guy was as unmovable as an ice pillar. His cool teal eyes connected with Rin's as he took a bite from his pop. "Yellow circle?"

"Don't play games with me. There're two yellow circles on the board so that means there's one left. I know you have it."

"I don't what you're talking about."

"Like hell you don't-!"

"Rin-senpai. It's still your turn…" Nitori interjected the fight with a timid tone.

With a grumble Rin begrudgingly laid down his tiles and earned a meager four points.

"Ah. It's my turn now?" Sosuke asked.

"Yeah."

The brunette laid out his remaining tiles and got double the points, tying his combos together with the one piece that everyone had been searching for...the yellow circle.

"You piece of garbage!" Rin shouted and threw down his clean popsicle stick causing some of the pieces to tremble. "I _knew_ you had that tile! You lied!"

"That's how you play if you want to win."

Rin bit back a slew of curses and sat down simmering with a scowl.

"Wow! Yamazaki-senpai sure has a poker face!" Momo laughed and then turned his own golden orbs down to his tiles. "Hnnn…"

"I'm worried for you, Momo-kun." Nitori murmured with his spoon in his mouth. "There aren't any tiles left to pull from the bag and you only have three-"

Before Nitori could even finish his sentence the young spitfire flipped down all of his pieces in a flurry of color.

"Sha _bam_!"

The rest of his classmates looked on in astonishment. Momo had managed to rack up fifteen points by connecting three loose ends none of them had noticed. Momo flashed a wolfish grin that reminded Rin of his former captain.

"Gotcha, suckers! Read it and weep!"

The game proceeded in much the same fashion until tallying up the points proved Momo to be the winner.

"How in the hell did that guy win…?" Rin and Nitori sat together with worn and exhausted expressions.

"Well, that was fun." Sosuke grunted as he stood up and rolled his shoulder around in its socket, earning a few pops. "But I'm tired now, so I'm kicking you guys out."

"Whaaaaa, so soon?" Momo whined as he glanced at the clock on the shelf. "But it's only 9:30. We could definitely play another round-"

"Momo…" Sosuke glared down at his underclassman through a shadow covering his eyes, making his usually icy gaze even more piercing. "Don't let your victory go to your head."

Momo and Nitori both shuddered then frantically began picking the tiles up off the floor. Even Rin had to admit Sosuke could be pretty scary when he wanted to.

"Fine then, we'll be going now! Good night, Rin-senpai, Yamazaki-senpai." Nitori waved to them and closed the door behind him with a soft click.

"Calling it a night early, eh?" Rin asked his roommate once they were alone.

Sosuke crossed his arms behind his head and looked out the open slider door. "Not really."

Rin arched a brow, but decided that he didn't want to pursue the conversation further.

"Well, whatever." Rin took the towel that was hanging around his shoulders and began to tousle his still wet hair dry. He had taken a shower before coming out to play that game with his friends and it was still wet on account of the stagnant, humid air. Rin reached for his hair brush which rested on the shelf.

"Oi." Something pulled on the hem of Rin's shirt near the small of his back. Turning around revealed that it was Sosuke tugging on the fabric and looking at him with those piercing teal eyes. "Let me do that."

Red orbs glanced down to his hair brush in his hand.

"What? Brush my hair?"

"Yeah."

Rin blinked. "...Why?"

"Why not?"

Rin stiffened as he thought of the idea. Was this another attempt of Sosuke's at having them 'do stuff' together?

The solitary brunette plopped down on the bottom bunk with his legs slightly spread apart.

"Go on. Sit down already."

Rin hung back for a moment, but then sat down cross-legged on the floor in the space Sosuke had created from parting his legs.

"Alright. I'm going to start now."

"Idiot, you don't need to narrate the whole thing…"

Then, Rin felt rough pads brush against the nape of his neck as Sosuke's fingers collected his red strands together. The light sensation of just his fingertips brushing against Rin's skin was enough to send shivers up his neck. Rin blushed as he glared his red orbs down to the wood floor below him. What was the matter with him? He touched that area all the time when washing and brushing his own hair. Why should it feel any different now that Sosuke was doing it?

Rin closed his eyes and pushed his loud thoughts to the back of his mind. He promised himself that he would stop trying to analyze everything and just focus on what Sosuke was doing. That was the whole point of them doing things like this together, wasn't it?

Sosuke was at least considerate enough to start brushing near the ends of Rin's hair first and then work his way upwards, rather than just yanking the brush through his hair from root to tip right from the start when it was tangled. This surprised Rin. He figured Sosuke wouldn't have any experience brushing long hair seeing as how he'd always kept his own dark brown hair short.

But Sosuke's lack of experience showed through once he started brushing around Rin's ears. The ignorant butterfly swimmer raked the bristles down across Rin's ears and he yelped.

"Ow-! Hey!"

"Nn? What's wrong?"

"I'll tell you what's wrong, you just brushed down over my ears!"

Sosuke blinked. "And?"

"And that hurts, idiot. Be more careful," The redheaded captain huffed as he turned back around. "My ears are very sensitive."

He felt Sosuke's hand pause midway through a brush.

"...Oh?"

"Hn? What is it?"

"Ah, nothing."

Rin wasn't sure exactly why but...he had a bad feeling that maybe he shouldn't have told Sosuke that information about his ears.

Sosuke continued to tend to Rin's hair, this time being careful to tuck Rin's fiery red locks behind his ears so that they stuck out and were clearly visible. Rin could understand why Sosuke was doing it, so he wouldn't make the same mistake twice. But what he wasn't sure about was why his friend's fingers lingered there for a few seconds than they were supposed to, running a rough pad down the shell of his ear to his soft and warm earlobe. Rin took in a very faint breath, surprised from the shivers that the small action sent down his neck. He wondered if Sosuke had done it on purpose, or if perhaps it was just an accident and his thumb just happened to caress his ear in such a way while he was adjusting his hair.

Rin dared to take a glance at the reflection of them sitting together in the glass door leading out on to the balcony. Sosuke's expression appeared nearly blank as always. He looked engaged with what he was doing, but no more than how he usually looked when he was preoccupied with mundane tasks like folding laundry or getting dressed. No, it must have been an accident, Rin concluded.

"There. All done." Sosuke handed the brush to Rin over his shoulder.

Much like their hand-holding session, the hair brushing ended sooner than Rin had expected...and perhaps sooner than he'd wanted it to.

"Well," Sosuke stood up from the bed and grabbed one of their controllers off the desk to turn on the console. "I was gonna watch that episode I recorded then go to bed. Want to watch it with me?"

"Yeah, sure I guess." Rin got up from his position on the floor and started to straighten things out from when they had company earlier.

"Oi...Rin."

"Hnn?"

Sosuke scratched the back of his neck and averted his teal eyes off to the side. "I thought...maybe we could sit together this time?"

Rin's red eyes rounded in shock slightly. After the hair brushing session they just had, Rin didn't expect Sosuke to ask for anything else. But, that wasn't to say that he was necessarily turned off from the idea.

"Yeah. That'd be fine."

"Okay."

Much like the other day, Sosuke turned off the lights and set things up on their console. Only this time when he crawled on to the bottom bunk he sat very close to Rin. Close enough that their sides brushed against each other.

"Excuse me."

Sosuke's deep voice was low and hushed as his lips came close to Rin's ear, making him shiver. Rin felt something snake around his back and then come to rest on his hip. Before he could even realize what it was, Sosuke pulled him closer up against his body so their sides were flush together and then just left his hand to rest on Rin's hip. The redhead's body stiffened reflexively, but then he made a conscious effort to relax his muscles. He didn't want to send Sosuke the wrong idea, or worse, make the guy think that he was intimidated by him.

It felt strange to have Sosuke's body pressed up against his like this. Him and Sosuke had been friends since childhood, so of course there had been times when they had sat close together and, at some point, even shared the same bed. But those times were different. They were only kids back then, and besides, him and Sosuke doing these small things meant something entirely different now…

This close Rin could smell the brunette's familiar scent clinging to his clothes. It was a comforting smell that pulled at Rin's eyelids, making them seem heavier. All the physical activities that had happened during the day seemed to weigh down on him now that Rin was snuggled up in bed with the lights off, leaning against something warm and soft. Rin really wanted to close his eyes and let his head come to rest on Sosuke's shoulder. He was just so tired. But...part of him hung back because he wasn't sure how Sosuke…

 _No, you know what? I don't care any more. I'm done beating around the bush and second guessing myself,_ the redhead firmly thought to himself. Closing his eyes, Rin leaned his head in to rest on Sosuke's shoulder. The immediate comfort that washed over him was enough to make him produce a small yawn, making wetness appear at the corners of his lashes. Half of him was slightly concerned about how Sosuke felt about doing this without asking him, and yet the other half of him was too tired to be concerned.

Suddenly, there came a soft weight on the top of Rin's head that stayed to rest there. Rin's red eyes peeked opened and he blushed. Was...Sosuke leaning his head against him too? The very thought had Rin's face flush with heat. Just like the other day when they had their fingers threaded together and were talking of memories past, Rin felt a tenderness that made his whole body feel warm. Rin had always felt that Sosuke was one of the few people on earth who intimately understood him, and honestly, he didn't mind things being that way. Despite what Rin had previously thought about this endeavor of theirs...he was starting to think that maybe he could learn to like being close with Sosuke in this way.

* * *

 **Whew -~- so there it is. There's chapter 4. I hope you like it. Even though there wasn't really anything juicy we finally had some stuff happen between our boys. I've already said this before, but I really do want to take things slow with these two because I just think that will be a better story. So I know it's slow for now, and all the reflecting and dialog can be a bit dry, but just wait until they get going.**

 **Btw, sorry if the whole "flash back" thingy was confusing and/or not clear. I wanted to use a different divider rather than just the same plain horizontal rule to segment when the flash backies started and ended but this site was being a total butt and wouldn't let me use anything else. So, yeah, sorry if things got confusing...**

 **Okays, welp. I'm gonna be honest. As much as I adore Sosuke and Rin (and I really do, those guys are mah OTP. Last scene had me choking up like DAAAAW), I'm thinking I'm gonna take a short break from writing this for a little bit. Like I've said on my personal page, I need to start focusing on other projects in my life, both academic and personal, because I don't have much time left until school starts. I'm going to try and produce one more chapter by the time I go back to school but I'm not really sure if that will happen. It really all depends on my motivation and if I have time.**

 **Well, leave a review if you enjoyed. Or leave a review if you have anything constructive, I like that stuff too. All of your kind words encourage me to keep writing.**

 **Bye Byeee~~**


	5. Adding Kindling to the Embers

**Chapter 5**

 ***~Adding Kindling to the Embers~***

* * *

" _But soft! What light through yonder window breaks! It is the east and Juliet is the sun!_ "

Rin leaned his face into his palm and pinched the bridge of his nose.

From his position up in the second floor of the theater, he could see the stage below quite well. A fairly handsome actor stood in the middle of it gazing up towards a tower with a balcony. Leaning on the railing of said balcony was the fair maiden called Juliet…

Or at least that's who it was supposed to be. Instead the casting crew had somehow managed to cram the biggest, burliest guy they could find into a tight, pink renaissance dress. The actor (who had his dark chest hair brimming over his lacy neckline) threaded his fat fingers together and rested his strong clefted chin upon them, batting his brown eyes down upon Romeo.

"I'm not sure if I can take this much longer…" Rin's voice sounded defeated.

A slightly irritated sigh sounded beside Rin a moment before a deep voice murmured, "Why did we have to-"

Rin cut Sosuke off before he could finish his sentence. "We had to come to this play because we owed the theater club one. You saw their faces when we turned in that police uniform I was wearing." Rin bit back a noise of embarrassment as he recalled the memory.

"Yeah," Sosuke concurred. "Who knew that president could get so scary..."

"We trashed their costume and lost their hat so…" Rin sighed and crossed his arms, slouching back in his seat. "Here we are, suffering through their first performance to make up for it."

"I know that. I was gonna ask why did we have to bring them along?" Sosuke hiked his thumb over in the general direction of the two people sitting next to him: one was a Momo, looking very engrossed with what was happening on stage and the other was Nitori, quietly munching on popcorn.

Rin shrugged in response to Sosuke's question.

"The president said to bring friends if I could. I figured the more tickets we bought the better we looked."

The voices from below wafted up to their lofty seats again:

" _O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?_ " The burly actor had changed his voice to try and match his part, making the performance even more laughable. Rin had to admit he was a dedicated actor, at least.

" _Deny thy father and refuse thy name. Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love, and I'll no longer be a Capulet_."

"Rin-senpai!" Momo kept his voice an enthusiastic whisper as he leaned across Sosuke, much to the brunette's discomfort. "I just thought of something!"

"What is it? And keep your voice down..."

"I just remembered, this is an all-boys school, right?"

"Yeah."

"Then that means that the cast is all guys too, right? So if Romeo and Juliet is a love story, does that mean…" Momo appeared to be hung up on his words.

"What? What is it?"

Momo gulped. "Do you think they're gonna, you know...k-kiss?"

Nitori choked on his popcorn and sprayed chunks of food onto the backside of someone's head in front of him as he coughed. Rin had a similar response, blushing as his own words caught in his throat.

"I…! I don't know!" He hissed in a mortified whisper. "What kind of question is that?!"

"Eh? Did I just ask something weird?! I would think everyone would've thought of it by no-"

"Momo…" Sosuke, having had enough of his space being invaded, pinched the tyke's nose to make him be quiet. "Enough already. You're making a scene."

"Nggh! Ah...Ow, Yamazaki-senpai…" The otter whimpered and rubbed his nose. "You can be so harsh sometimes…"

Their childish banter faded away as Rin became absorbed in his thoughts. Of course Rin knew that Romeo and Juliet was a tragic romance, and he also knew that Samezuka Academy had an all male student body. Though for some reason he hadn't put two and two together in his mind until Momo had said something. Two guys kissing…

...how did he feel about that?

He wasn't sure...didn't he like it? Shouldn't he like it? Or...at least maybe get used to the idea considering...

Rin squirmed in his seat, suddenly feeling very self conscious and awkward to be watching this with a certain someone sitting next to him. Why did Momo have to go and bring that up? Things weren't awkward at all until Momo went and opened his big fat mouth. Though Rin supposed it was only a matter of time before it all played out on stage...

A flurry of movement on the stage down below caught Rin's attention and pulled him back to the present.

As the shy Juliet tried to flee, Romeo seized him by the hand. The maiden whipped around, blushing with his hand over his surprised mouth. Romeo held him captive with a wolfish grin and a playful glint in his eyes.

" _My sweet Juliet, if I profane with my unworthiest hand this holy shrine, the gentle sin is this: my lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand to smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss._ "

Casting a quick glance sideways, Rin focused intently on what was unfolding, now suddenly invested in the mediocre play.

Juliet fanned himself, trying to hide an embarrassed smile.

" _Handsome pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, for saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch, and palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss._ "

Romeo drew nearer, his voice dropping low.

" _Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?_ "

" _Yes, pilgrim_ ," Juliet playfully drew circles on the flat front of Romeo's chest, " _lips that they must use in prayer_."

Smiling, Romeo clasped his hand over the big burly actor's, which dwarfed his own.

" _O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do. They pray; grant thou, lest faith turn to despair._ "

To his embarrassment Rin realized he was leaning forward in his seat and his pulse was beating quicker. He shook it off and paid attention; he couldn't afford to miss this…

Juliet coyly batted his fake lashes at Romeo.

" _Saints do not move, though they grant for prayers' sake_."

The two actor's faces slowly started to gravitate towards each other and Rin held his breath.

" _Then move not_ ," Romeo spoke inches away from his lover's lips, totally mesmerized by his eyes, " _while my prayer's effect...I take…_ "

Romeo closed the remaining distance between them by capturing Juliet's hairy upper lip in a deep, but chaste, kiss.

Rin's hand flew up to cover his mouth which popped open in a surprised 'o'. He felt a hot, mortified blush creep over his face as he shrank back into his seat, wishing to disappear from sight.

Similarly, his friends showed various levels of discomfort. Except Momo, of course.

"Pfffft keekeekee, that's pretty funny~~!"

"It is not!–"

"Ow! Rin-senpai, why'd you kick meeehee!?" Momo sobbed.

"What's with you all of a sudden?"

Sosuke's voice made Rin produce a startled noise of embarrassment. He averted his gaze off to the side and scowled.

"Nothing's with me all of a sudden. I...just can't stand it when someone doesn't appreciate the arts."

Sosuke laughed through his nose. "You're so full of it."

Rin made the mature decision to not give in to Sosuke's taunt and instead turned his attention back to the play, watching it without really paying attention to what was happening.

Of all people, Rin inwardly growled, Sosuke especially should understand why this was a sensitive subject for him right now.

He stole a glance sideways at his best friend, but sadly found Sosuke's face an unreadable mask like always. It was never easy to tell how or what Sosuke was thinking, though he didn't appear nearly as uncomfortable as Rin concerning what just happened.

Rin leaned his cheek into his fist and let a sigh out through his nose as he wondered...him and Sosuke...would they eventually kiss? And if so, when? Soon? Was Sosuke expecting it and Rin was just being a "prude"?...Just the thought had him hyper aware of the small pocket of space separating their bodies and he was suddenly thankful for the gloom in the theater, feeling like it covered up his signs of discomfort. Hand holding and sitting together was one thing but kissing...kissing was in a whole other category...a category he hadn't thought about before.

No matter how hard Rin tried he couldn't bring himself to actually focus on the play from that moment on. His mind was off somewhere different...

* * *

"Whew, jeez. Thank god that's over."

"I dunno." Nitori laughed nervously. "I thought it was kind of good, all things considered."

A comfortable silence lapsed over the group, filled with the soft rolling sound of the crowd dispersing out of the theater.

"Well," Rin sighed while stretching his arms over his head. "It's pretty late, I think we're just gonna head back to the dorm."

"We'll see you guys later. Momo-kun and I are gonna get dinner before the kitchen closes."

"Alright. See ya."

Rin waved their friends off as they headed toward the cafeteria.

"Well," Rin stuffed his hands in his pockets, his eyes trained on the ground. "Guess it's time we head back then?"

"Actually…" Sosuke spoke just as Rin turned in the direction of the dorms. "You go ahead, I've got something to do."

"Wha?" Rin's red brow furrowed. "Something to do? It's already 7:30…"

Sosuke didn't offer any explanation, but instead turned on his heel and started walking away.

"I'll be back late. Don't wait up for me."

"Ah? Wait, Sosuke-!"

Rin made an attempt to grab Sosuke's wrist but the tall brunette was too fast for him and instead his hand closed around empty air. Rin simply stood there and watched his back slip further away into the crowd with smoldering red eyes.

"Where have you been going lately…" Rin muttered only loud enough for himself to hear.

Rin's concerned eyes looked out the windows of the school and saw the evening sky filling with dark grey rain clouds. It looked as though it was going to rain, maybe for at least a few days. He remembered Sosuke walking away without so much as a jacket on, and hoped he wouldn't get caught in the storm. With nothing else to do, Rin tried to push his troubled thoughts to the back of his mind and went to his dorm room alone.

* * *

"And so, I put my pretzels away. And I'm pretty sure she saw me put my pretzels away. Actually I know she saw because she watched me with her stupid hawk-eyes while I did it."

Rin found himself engrossed with Momo's ridiculous story from math class despite the clamoring noise from the cafeteria.

"Afterwards I opened my packet to start the test and then my teacher comes over and stands next to me. And I was like, what is she doing? Why is she just standing there? I looked over, and she was holding this huge binder in her hands, scouring through it. But I try to ignore her because I only had fifteen minutes to take the test and...well...math isn't my best subject." Momo chuckled and scratched the back of his fiery head.

"But then she leaned in with her binder and pointed to a spot on the syllabus and was like 'it says right here there's no food in class'. In front of everyone!" Momo pulled handfuls of his own hair. "And I'm just like are you for real? Who actually goes out of their way to embarrass their student like that?!"

"Momo, keep your voice down." Rin said between his laughter.

"It was awfullllluuuuu!" Momo sobbed. "I failed my test because I was so upset! I couldn't focus at all!"

Rin let out a bout of laughter he'd been holding back. Just then Sosuke stood up and started gathering his trash on to his tray.

"You're leaving?" Rin's eyes shifted over Sosuke with scrutiny. Even though Sosuke had finished eating, usually they would all hang out together until they'd collectively finished before they left. Everyone else still had half a tray to eat.

"Where are you going?"

"It's no where important. I won't be back till later so I'll see you guys."

And just like that, the butterfly swimmer walked away without any further explanation.

Rin thought it was just him who felt the pause that followed was uncomfortable, but after a few seconds Nitori spoke up in a meek voice.

"Is it just me, or does Yamazaki-senpai seem more aloof than usual lately?"

"Yeah, I've noticed it too…" Rin muttered.

"He's been skipping practices now also. What do you think is the matter with him?"

"Mnnnn...maybe he's found a girlfriend?"

Momo's words sent an unconscious stab through Rin's gut that left him feeling stricken but confused as to why.

"Eeeh? A girlfriend? Well...maybe…" Nitori scratched the back of his head. "It's entirely possible...Rin-senpai?"

"Huh?"

"Oh, nothing. You were just making a strange face all of a sudden is all."

"Oh, right." Rin turned away in the direction Sosuke left, embarrassed to have been caught with his emotions on his face. "I agree it's strange…"

"I've got an idea." Momo leaned in with a wolfish grin. "If we really want to find out where he's been going lately we should follow him and see where he goes."

"Eh, Momo-kun I don't think that's a responsible idea." Nitori regarded the mischievous gleam in his friend's eyes with a subtle look of admonishment. "Wouldn't it be more mature to ask Yamazaki-senpai direc-"

"Hold on…" The two underclassmen turned and quivered when they saw Rin's red orbs brooding under a shadow on his face. "What were you saying about following Sosuke, Momo?"

"Well, yeah. Doesn't that make more sense than wasting our time asking questions he won't answer? If it was something he felt okay talking about don't you think he'd have told us already?"

"But Momo-kun...spying on someone isn't-"

"What're we still sitting around talking for?" Rin stood up out of his seat and began trotting away without even picking up his tray. "Let's get going before we lose him!"

"Eh!? R-Rin-senpai, your tray-!"

"Ehehehehee! Wait for me, Rin-senpai!" Momo flew after him like a red comet.

"Aaaagh, Momo-kun, not you too...haa...jeez…" Nitori sighed as he scrambled to clean up all three trays at once. "Hold on a second, guys!"

* * *

Wine-red irises peered around the corner of the hallway, fixing themselves on the broad back of their target.

"I've found him," Rin muttered into his cell phone. "He's headed down the east hallway."

 _"Toward the main lobby?"_ Answered Nitori's voice from the other end of the device.

"Yeah."

 _"Momo-kun said he'd be stationed there. Do you see him coming, Momo-kun?..."_

 _"..."_

 _"Momo-kun?"_

With all three of them being on a conference call, Momo should have easily heard and responded to their question.

 _"Eeeeh...we've lost Momo-kun for some reason..."_

Rin clicked his tongue in annoyance. "That guy…this was his idea."

Sosuke reached the end of the hall and turned the corner. Rin sprang into action. Moving as fast as he could, he hugged the side of the wall in case for any reason Sosuke decided to look behind him and discover he was being followed.

Rin reached the end of the hall and stopped short when he realized that Sosuke wasn't too far away at a vending machine.

 _"Rin-senpai?_ " Nitori's voice sounded concerned. _"He was coming my way but I lost sight of him. Do you see him?"_

"Yes. The subject is selecting a beverage from an automated vending machine."

Nitori made a startled noise.

 _"Th-that's right where I am!"_ His voice was a panicked whisper. _"He's right on top of me but I can't see him. What's he doing?"_

Sosuke had his finger to his chin while glaring at the machine, pondering which drink he wanted.

"He's just standing there…" Rin's eyes narrowed to slivers. "Menacingly…"

"Rin-senpai!"

Rin let out a yell and scrambled to catch his phone from nearly falling out of his hands. He whirled around to confront the voice which had crept up on him.

It was Momo, his skin a putrid shade of green, his eye sockets and lips a morbid black and his usual vibrant orange hair was a dingy brown. Most frightening of all was the huge, weeping, gaping wound going across his face. The pungent smell of latex told Rin it was all just makeup.

"Momo!" Rin cried, and then reigned in his anger to lower his voice. "What _the hell_ are you doing! And...why are you dressed like that?!"

"Heehee, don't I look amazing? The theater club is having an expo and they were doing monster makeup demonstrations! Raaawwr! Ahaha look at me, I'm a zombieeee!"

Despite himself, Rin felt anger flush his cheeks red and gritted his teeth together.

"Why you…"

 _"Rin-senpai? What's going on?"_

Nitori's voice sounding from his phone pulled Rin back to the matter at hand. He quickly looked around the corner and hissed a curse under his breath.

"He's gone!" Rin growled into his cell phone. "Move towards the main lobby, he was headed that way. And don't let yourself be seen!"

 _"Right!"_

"You're coming with me." Rin grabbed Momo by his shirt and stalked off down the hallway with the otter in tow.

"Waah! Watch the hair, Rin-senpai!"

* * *

"Rin-senpai." Nitori projected his hushed voice to them from his station behind a potted plant, waving to get their attention. "Over here."

"Hey, we miss anything?"

"No, he's headed down the foyer now...uuhh...Momo-kun? Why do you-"

"We're not going there right now." Rin interjected. "I don't think my blood pressure can take it."

All three of the spies peered through the gaps in the plant's leaves and watched their somber classmate walk out the front doors.

"Hn? He's leaving the school?" Momo's words echoed Rin's thoughts.

"What's he doing?" Nitori's eyebrows shot up in concern. "It's pouring rain outside and all he has on is a windbreaker jacket."

"More importantly…" Rin muttered as his deep red orbs watched Sosuke's lonely profile walk towards the shuttle stop which would take him off campus. "...Where is he going?"

* * *

Later that evening found Rin with his body draped over his mattress, eyes staring up at the underside of Sosuke's empty bunk bed above him.

 _"...and it doesn't look like this rain is going to go away for a while, unfortunately."_

Rin only half listened to the news forecaster's report of the upcoming weather. The bright light from the tv screen bathed the room in an irritating white light. Rin shifted his gaze to watch the fat raindrops slam against his windows and drip down like angry tears. The night beyond them was pitch black. It was 9 p.m., and Rin was beginning to worry about Sosuke's trip home...

 _"The real storm is manifesting here in the south, and as it makes its way toward us, it's going to build momentum, accumulating into a massive storm. In the next few days we might even have a typhoon on our hands-"_

Just then the door to their dorm room swung open and Rin sat up. Coming through the door was the tall and broad profile of a dark haired man, thoroughly drenched from walking in the pouring rain.

"Sosuke?"

Rin saw his friend's hands pause as he was untying his shoes.

"You're still up?"

"Yeah, I am. Where have you been?" Rin didn't waste time beating around the bush. He felt like he might be overstepping a boundary by confronting Sosuke about the private aspects of his life, but he needed to know. Just like Sosuke was able to tell there was something wrong with Rin without him having to say so, Rin could tell there was something seriously wrong with his friend.

Sosuke turned on the light and started to gather his toiletries so he could go take a shower. "I told you not to wait up for me."

"Don't try to change the subject." Rin flicked off the television. He rolled out of bed and stood with a firm stance in front of the door, his arms crossed and his fiery red orbs unmoveable.

"You've been unusually distant lately, and you've been slacking on our practices. If you miss too many I'll have to kick you off the team. If you thought I wouldn't say anything or give you a free pass just because we're friends then you're even stupider than I thought...What's going on with you?" Rin's voice was a bit softer towards the end.

Sosuke was silent for a moment, teal blue eyes fixed on the floor and hands balled into fists at his sides. "...I can't tell you."

"Too bad. I didn't want to talk to you about my problems before either, but you forced me to like a stubborn jerk. So now it's your turn: spill it."

Sosuke let out an exasperated sigh and, draping his towel over his shoulder, made to move around Rin to the door. "I'm going to take a shower-"

"Hold it!" This time Rin successfully caught on to Sosuke's wrist and held firm.

Surprisingly, Sosuke didn't snatch his arm away from him like Rin thought he would. Instead the stoic swimmer stood frozen in place with his back turned, neither saying or doing anything.

"...Don't walk away from me, Sosuke." Rin's voice was a low whisper, shivering with something he couldn't quite explain.

"...Rin. Let go."

"I won't. If I do...you'll only drift farther away from me…"

Sosuke finally peered at Rin over his shoulder. "What are you talking about?"

Rin bit down on his lower lip.

"Look...I…" His cheeks stinging with embarrassment, Rin fixed his eyes on Sosuke's wrist in his grasp and forced himself to say the words he'd been brooding over all evening.

"...I know that even though you're... helping me figure stuff out...I...I know it doesn't mean we're, like…" Rin shifted his gaze off to the side. "Exclusive, or whatever…"

Sosuke turned to face him then, dark brows angry. "What?-"

Rin pushed through, determined to get this out.

"All I'm saying is that if you're seeing someone, you don't need to hide it from me out of politeness or to spare my feelings." Rin dared a glance upwards at Sosuke's face and for once found his handsome features fixed in an expression of shock. So had Rin guessed correctly?

"I can't expect and I don't want you to hold yourself back for me, especially after all you've done-"

"Cut the crap, Rin." When the redhead looked up he found Sosuke's blue eyes hooded and dark underneath his angry brows, like the thick storm clouds gathered outside. "You really think I'm the kind of person who'd do something like that?"

"I…" Rin blinked his eyes, feeling bewildered. Do something like what? Be unfaithful? It wasn't as if Sosuke had anything to be faithful to, they weren't... _lovers_ or anything like that...

Like always, it was as if Sosuke knew just what he was thinking, as he continued.

"Commitment or not, I wouldn't mess around with anyone else while doing things with you, Rin. I thought you'd know better."

Rin finally released Sosuke's wrist and his brow furrowed in confusion. "Then...if that's not the reason...then why-?"

Sosuke let out a sigh, unable to meet Rin's gaze. "Look, I already said I can't tell you. Sorry…"

A heavy silence fell over the two, during which Rin didn't have any idea what to say. Whatever it was that Sosuke was going through he seemed very adamant about not telling Rin about it. Maybe he was better off to not pry, but…

"It doesn't have anything to do with us, I promise. So don't worry about it."

"Sosuke, you can't just tell me to not worry about it and expect me to…" Looking at him properly now, Rin noticed Sosuke's head and shoulders were still drenched in rain water. His dark brown hair looked jet black and little droplets were dripping off the ends of his strands and beading on his skin.

Rin made a noise of irritation. "Idiot, at least dry yourself off. You trying to catch a cold too?" Without even thinking, Rin snatched the towel off Sosuke's shoulder and draped it over his head, starting to dry him off. After a second, Rin realized what he was doing and abruptly withdrew his hands, feeling heat rise to his cheeks. A stifling awkwardness clenched throat that kept him from recovering gracefully.

"Uh...I...sorry…" Rin scratched the back of his head and looked anywhere but at Sosuke. What possessed him to just do that all of a sudden? Better yet, why was he so flustered about it?

"No, it's fine. Actually…" Rin looked up at Sosuke and saw him with his fingers on his chin and a dark brow quirked in thought. "Maybe you should dry me off?"

Rin's red eyes blinked in confusion. "Huh?"

"I mean, we haven't tried anything since that time we sat together. So...why not?"

"Why not?" Rin's brow wrinkled. "Maybe because...it's stupid?"

Sosuke's brows darkened. "It's not stupid."

"It is too. How is me drying you off with a towel supposed to...how is that considered…"

"Isn't it obvious?"

Rin shot his friend a hooded glare that said 'obviously' not.

"Think about it: what's the basis for all forms of intimacy?"

Sosuke's question caught Rin off guard. Intimacy? What the...where was he going with this?

"It's being close together and comfortable in each others' space: something you need to learn."

Rin met Sosuke's gaze with eyes like ignited sparks. "Who says I'm uncomfortable?"

Sosuke merely crossed his arms as his stern, teal eyes poured cold water over Rin's embers, extinguishing any coals of rebelliousness.

"Alright, alright, I see your point…" Rin looked at the towel draped around Sosuke's shoulders and for some reason felt like his arms were a bit stiff as he reached for it.

"You can come a little closer, you know." Sosuke rumbled in his deep voice. Before Rin could even snap back a retort, he felt Sosuke's broad hand on his lower back, and he stumbled a bit as Sosuke pulled him closer to his body.

Rin tipped his head downward towards Sosuke's chest to hide the color on his face.

"Idiot...I know that…" Hesitantly, his hands began to work. Sosuke let his eyes close as Rin gently tousled his hair dry from a slick black to a fluffy dark, dark brown. Rin's hands moved down to dry around his ears, over his cheekbones, and around his jaw.

Being this close to Sosuke forced Rin to look at one piece of him at a time: from his thick eyelashes, to his full lips, to those dark brows that gave off an intimidating impression akin to a whale shark.

Rin moved down to dry around his shoulders and neck. This close, Rin could smell Sosuke's scent radiating off of him, made even more potent by the fresh rain water evaporating off his skin: it was a scent of freshly cleaned clothes mixed with the faintest traces of his sweat and cologne. The smell filled Rin with a warm, endearing sense of nostalgia that had him forget where he was and what he was doing for a moment.

Rin was just studying the tan skin of his neck and his sharp collar bones when Sosuke opened his eyes and looked down at him with smoldering, icy-teal irises. Rin could almost feel Sosuke's gaze coming down on him like the rain pouring against the shuttering windows. It chilled him, and he suppressed a shiver.

"...You don't have to watch me like that, you know…"

"I know…" Sosuke's gravelly voice tumbled on to the top of Rin's forehead, disturbing his red bangs with his warm breath.

Rin finished his drying and stepped away, leaving the towel hanging around Sosuke's neck.

"There, you're all done." He started to retreat, eager to be out of his friend's personal space.

"Wait." Sosuke called before Rin could flee. "Don't you...maybe want to do something else?"

Sosuke's question made his stomach lurch and he swallowed. "What do you mean?"

"Well, I dunno." Sosuke ran his fingers through his short hair. "Don't you feel like...that wasn't enough?"

Rin made an uncomfortable noise. He supposed he saw Sosuke's point: even though Rin considered what he just did an accomplishment, he could understand how it couldn't really be seen as an accomplishment in anyone else's eyes.

"I guess so…"

"We should get used to being close for longer than a few seconds. Otherwise we won't-"

"I get it, I get it. So...w-what did you want to do?"

Sosuke crossed his arms. "That's up to you."

"Umm…" Panicking, Rin searched his mind for ideas. The way Sosuke said it made it seem like he was up for anything, but Rin wasn't...

"H-how about…" Rin said the first thing that came to his mind. "A...shoulder massage?"

Whew, yeah. That shouldn't be too weird.

Sosuke's brows shot upwards and he blinked.

"A shoulder massage?" A dark shadow passed over Sosuke's face and his gaze dropped to the ground. "I'm...not sure that's a good idea."

"Come on." Rin growled. "Didn't you say it was up to me?"

Sosuke let out a reluctant sigh. "Alright, fine. But you better do it properly."

Sosuke closed the space between them and stood there with his hands in his pockets. Rin gave him a wary glance up and down.

"Oi. Quit playing around. Take off your jacket already."

"No. You do it."

Sosuke's command made Rin blink in surprise. He...wanted him to remove his clothes? Rin shook off the weird feeling of nervousness and stepped up closer to him.

"Fine then, have it your way." He was determined to not let this bother him. He was simply removing Sosuke's jacket, and there was nothing to be flustered about. His fingers grabbed Sosuke's zipper and yanked it down.

"Oi." Rin's breath caught in his throat as Sosuke caught ahold of his hand. Looking upward Rin met firmly set teal eyes. "Don't half-ass this."

Rin tipped his face downward, unable to meet his frosty gaze and sighed.

"Idiot...what's the point in dragging it out?" Despite his complaining, Rin did as he was asked. He unzipped Sosuke's jacket slowly, thereby making them stay close for longer. Rin's fingers pushed Sosuke's jacket off the tops of his shoulders and let it slide down his arms, revealing inches of tanned skin and corded muscles as it went, until they let it fall to the floor in a forgotten heap. Rin swallowed and looked up at Sosuke for guidance.

"Well?" Sosuke arched a dark brow at him. "Shouldn't you take off my shirt too?"

"I...guess so…"

"Well, hurry up then."

Rin felt his cheeks sting. "Shut up, I'm doing it, okay?"

Rin looked at the hem of Sosuke's shirt which ended just above his pants.

"Uh…"

Sosuke sighed through his nose. "You do know how to take off a shirt, don't you?"

"I'm getting to it, jeez…" Rin's fingers gripped the hem of Sosuke's shirt.

"Remember-"

"I got it." Rin knew Sosuke wouldn't let him half-ass this by rushing, so he was sure to take his time peeling the drenched shirt off his body. The first thing Rin noticed was the faint path of dark hairs trailing from beneath Sosuke's navel down beyond into his pants, the white elastic band to his boxers playfully peeking over the dark denim. As Rin removed his thin undershirt, he realized there were more subtleties about Sosuke's body that he hadn't noticed until then. There were very dark and tiny freckles here and there dotting his skin, as if a mischievous cherub had flecked the smooth canvas of his abs and chest with a paint brush. His nipples were a dark wine red, and had gone pert from the cold. To his embarrassment, Rin realized he was staring at him. He hurriedly pulled the garment the rest of the way up and over Sosuke's head, somehow feeling that stifling embarrassment come back again.

Why was he feeling so weird around Sosuke like this? It wasn't as if he and Sosuke hadn't been this physically close before. And he'd seen him half-naked and wet countless times. Now that he thought about it, Rin remembered how not too long ago at Ren's party they were both in their underwear, being close and touching each other and even that hadn't been weird to him (horribly embarrassing, yes, but not weird).

Now, Rin could barely bring himself to look at Sosuke without feeling strange. His heart seemed to be speeding up in his chest from being so close to him and his stomach felt like it was churning and sick. Rin supposed what really had him feeling awkward was the act of undressing Sosuke. It felt so private and intimate and...and it was _Sosuke_ , for crying out loud…Where in the world were these changes coming from when before he could be close and not feel anything at all?

"Alright. I'll sit right here?"

"Sure…"

Sosuke took a seat on the floor in front of Rin's bed and Rin settled in behind him on the mattress.

For a moment Rin only stared down at the back of Sosuke's head and shoulders. His sharp teeth worried at his bottom lip and he felt his underarms sweating.

"You can start whenever."

For once, Rin didn't feel the need to requite Sosuke's sarcastic comment with his own rebuttal of sass. "I know…"

 _Okay Rin, go ahead and start touching him now. It's not a big deal...it's...just Sosuke..._

Rin raised his hands and was about to begin the massage, but something had his burning orbs fascinated with Sosuke's thick and dark hair. He had the strange desire to touch it, though he knew it was weird for him to feel that way…

Rin slid his fingertips into Sosuke's soft brown hair and let his hands get lost feeling his roots.

Sosuke's head perked up in confusion.

"Oi-"

"Just...shut up, Sosuke…" Rin felt horribly embarrassed letting himself have this indulgence. He didn't need to try explaining himself on top of it too.

Thankfully, the brunette did as he was told, and simply closed his eyes as he let Rin massage his scalp.

Rin ran his fingertips down to the soft hairs around the nape of Sosuke's neck, now mesmerized with that part of his body and saw a visible shiver run through his friend's shoulders. It...just seemed like such an intimate area to touch.

For a split second, Rin had the curious urge to bury his nose into Sosuke's dark hair and breathe in that relaxing scent that was uniquely his, to feel his soft hair against his lips and doze off... Immediately afterwards he was so surprised at himself for having thought that, his hands unconsciously withdrew from Sosuke's body.

"Uhm...right...I-I'll start now."

"Okay..."

Rin finally smoothed his hands over the broad expanse of Sosuke's neck and shoulders and the brunette tensed up. His skin was cold to the touch like frost, probably freezing from walking in the rain. But once Rin ran his hands over Sosuke's shoulders, using his fingertips to locate any areas of condensed stress, he slowly felt his friend's shoulders relax, melting underneath his warm hands. Rin found a wealth of stress embedded in Sosuke's right deltoid and trapezius muscles. After giving the area a small rub to warm him up, Rin began to gently massage the area.

The silence that lapsed over them was made slightly more bearable with the sound of the rain hammering against their windows, but otherwise neither of the two males made a sound. Rin wondered if Sosuke was even enjoying it at all, or if he was actually doing a horrible job and Sosuke was just being considerate by being quiet. But as Rin was thinking this and moved his hands up his neck to the back of his ear to massage the deep pain in his trunk, Sosuke sighed and his skin glazed over with goose bumps.

After a while of neither of them saying anything, Rin sort of became mentally removed from the situation and started to be very engrossed with what he was doing. Some of his embarrassment melted away and he started to massage his friend's muscles in earnest, using his fingertips to apply firm amounts of pressure in areas of concentrated stress.

"Mmmnn...Rin, there…" A gravelly voice came from in front of him, surprising the daylights out of Rin. For a moment, he was so focused on what he was doing he forgot that Sosuke was even there at all.

He tried to ignore the rising heat on his neck and ears and continued on. He moved over to Sosuke's trapezius area and dug into his skin with his blunt fingertips, hard but not too hard, unraveling the tight knots he found there.

Sosuke pressed his back further into Rin's hands. "Aaahh...Rin. Harder…"

Rin withdrew his hands like he'd been frost bitten.

"Kn-knock it off, would you?"

"Mn? What are you talking about?"

"The hell do you mean 'what am I talking about'?" Rin was so flustered, he realized his sentences sounded juvenile. He ran his fingers through his bangs and looked off to the side. "I...you're making weird noises and...well it's weird."

"Oh...I didn't even...Sorry…" Sosuke unconsciously rubbed the back of his neck. He didn't turn around, but Rin thought he saw the tops of his ears turning pink. "Do you still want to keep going?"

"Eh? Well…" It was Rin's turn to blush now. "I dunno...do you want me to?"

"Yeah, it felt really good. I'm sorry for making you feel weird, I'll stay quiet this time."

Rin returned his hands to Sosuke's frame and began to work at his tense muscles once again. He worked at the tension found in his shoulder blade, shoulder and neck until he felt the group of muscles grow nice and fluid. The whole time Sosuke was careful to keep any noises down to a soft sigh or a growl when Rin worked out some snaps and pops from his joints. At length, Rin felt like he had finished the job.

"There. I think that's it."

Sosuke sat forward and tested out his shoulder, rolling it around in a very fluid motion without so much as a crack.

"How...does it feel?"

"Hnnn...It feels great." Sosuke turned and gave him a teasing smirk. "That's surprising."

For some reason that small quirk of Sosuke's mouth sent a weird sensation through Rin's gut.

"What's that supposed to mean? You thought I'd destroy you or something?"

"Pretty much." Sosuke chuckled.

"Hey now, gimme a little more credit than that..." Rin tried to maintain an air of indifference, but for some reason his stomach felt nervous to the point where he was a bit queasy.

Sosuke swore softly under his breath as they both glanced at the clock on their desk.

"It's already 10."

"Yeah, we should go to bed if we want any chance of getting up tomorrow."

"Right."

The whole time Sosuke undressed to get into his pajamas Rin found himself avoiding looking at him. It made Rin oddly flustered to look at him, but an even greater feeling was his confusion as to why. Ever since he and Sosuke had shared a room they'd witnessed each other get changed countless times. Why was it weird now...

"Oi, Rin." A baritone voice called to him, snapping him out of his daydream.

"What?"

Sosuke paused on his ladder and leaned against it with his hip, smiling down at Rin with his arms crossed. "We should do more things like that soon."

Rin felt heat creeping across his face and had to look away.

"Sure, whatever..."

He heard Sosuke make the last few steps on to his ladder and settle into his bed overhead. "Night."

"Yeah...night."

Rin switched off the light and crawled into his freezing cold sheets. Normally, the sound of rain falling upon the roof helped Rin get to sleep. He found it calming and the gentle tapping upon the glass made him feel safe. But no amount of rain could soothe him to sleep that night. Rin had much difficulty falling asleep, his underarms damp, stomach still nervous, and events replaying in his head.

* * *

Rin's sharp teeth bit into the tangy metal of his coach whistle and on its shrill scream his swim team members plunged head first into the water.

"C'mon! Let's move it, Huninosuka!" Rin roared at one of his blonde-haired swimmers for falling behind, at least superficially fulfilling his role as captain.

The echoey clamor of splashing and yelling in the Samezuka pool room created an encapsulating pocket of noise that almost canceled out the loudness of Rin's hyperactive thoughts...almost.

Wine-red eyes shifted over to the tall and somber athlete in the third lane, his powerful arms pumping and his massive upper body repetitively thrusting in and out of the water. Despite how many practices Sosuke had previously skipped it didn't seem like it had affected him at all. Rin hadn't seen him in the weight room either, so he was especially surprised to see Sosuke not only keeping pace with everyone else, but even pulling ahead.

Rin took in a long breath through his nose and let out a petulant huff. He wasn't ignorant to the fact that he and Sosuke had begun to talk about something important the previous night, before they both got...distracted…

Rin shook his head to bring his focus back to his team, and to get rid of the heat creeping up his neck.

Could he possibly be making too big a deal out of where Sosuke was spending his time when they weren't together? Really, it wasn't as if either of them didn't have lives outside of school or practice. So why did Rin care so much all of a sudden?

 _Well, maybe it's because he's being so damn suspicious about it._

Rin's mouth turned down at the corners as he pondered: should he continue to press Sosuke on the issue or just let things be?

Rin bit down on his lower lip and started taping his heel.

 _...He said he wasn't messing around with anyone, and I don't think he's_ lying _...so then what could be the reason he won't he tell me…?_

The swimmers were approaching their last lap and Rin pulled his focus back to his stop watch and reality once again.

The monstrous splashing progressively ceased as one by one the athletes touched the wall, giving way to a chorus of heavy panting. Even among a crowd, Rin's ears picked up on someone who sounded especially labored. To his surprise, when he looked he saw it was Sosuke with his shoulders heaving and his head pressed against the pool's edge. Maybe that powerful stroke of his wasn't as effortless as he made it out to seem.

At length, everyone exited the pool and gathered around Rin for his closing statement.

Rin's red eyes flashed over to Sosuke for a quick second. Whoa. He definitely did not look good, his expression looking worn and wan.

"You guys are improving. Excellent work, I want to continue to see this effort in all of you. Next time we meet on Wednesday, I want to see us shave off even more time, so until then keep working hard and remember to exercise. Everyone finish cleaning up and you're dismissed."

"Yes, sir!"

Upon Rin's word the boys dispersed in all directions, like pool balls being broken up on a pool table. When they scattered Rin lost sight of the dark, mysterious 8-ball he'd been concentrating on all evening. His eyes hunted among the chaos of the other colors for that sable shade of almost-black, not wanting him to sink into a pocket too soon and elude him once again.

At the last minute Rin saw him stumble into the locker rooms. Rin locked his targets and took off in pursuit.

The locker rooms were empty and silent while everyone else was still in the pool room cleaning up, so it was very easy for Rin to pick up on the small rustling sounds coming from the back row.

"Sosuke-" he called out, as he approached the corner, but upon rounding it and seeing Sosuke's appearance, the rest of what Rin had been about to say died in his throat.

"Rin…"

Sosuke wobbled slightly as he turned to look at him with dull teal eyes, they were missing their usual healthy shimmer. His skin looked ashen, completely absent from the rosy flush that's supposed to be present after exercise.

"Sosuke...what's wrong with you?"

"Nothing...I…"

All at once Sosuke staggered, his eyes rolled close, and his legs sagged from under him as he collapsed forward.

"Sosuke!"

Rin rushed to catch him and slowly sank to the ground under Sosuke's 161 pounds of deadweight, breaking his fall. Rin called out to him again, lightly slapping his cheek to try and rouse him from his dizzy spell: but there was no response. His head lolled to the side, lifeless.

Everything around him froze. Rin's blood slugged through his veins, his breathing faltered, the noises from the pool room sucked into a vacuum and became distant echoes; at the same time, adrenaline burst through Rin's body, sharpening his vision and setting his muscles on fire.

"Sosuke!" He cried out again, but no response. Shit!...tears pricked at his eyes and blurred his vision. Everyone was still in the pool room and probably wouldn't hear him call for help. What should he do? He couldn't just leave him there. Was Sosuke even still breathing?!

Rin lay Sosuke down flat on the tile and placed his ear to his lips. He could hear just the faintest of breaths, but that hardly comforted him.

"Rin…"

The redhead started back. The voice was so faint and breathless, he likely wouldn't have heard it if his ear hadn't been right up against Sosuke's mouth.

Rin could see Sosuke's eyes darting back and forth beneath his eyelids.

"…Should...tell you…"

 _Tell me? Tell me what?_

Sosuke's dark bangs were plastered down wet against his forehead with sweat.

"So...rry...hurt..ing...it hurts."

 _'It hurts'?_ Rin blinked his fiery eyes. _What on Earth is he talking about?_

Just then he heard the locker room door burst open and his boisterous teammates exploded into the room, shattering Rin's paralysis.

"Guys! Help! I need help back here, quickly!"

* * *

 ****Hey , sorry about that weird coded post earlier, I don't know how that happened. Thank you for whoever brought that to my attention, I honestly wouldn't have noticed.**

 **Hello again guys. First off, let me say thank you for all your patience. I know it's been a super long time since I've updated this story. To tell you the truth I've actually been writing more (and have a lot more written) for this story. I did that thing were I write a super lot, originally planning for it all to be one chapter but then it's like waaaaay too long. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that there's more coming and to just be patient.**

 **I don't know if you guys can tell this, but I'm not a disciplined writer at all and so...going into this story I have no outline! Nothing! So sometimes that might be the reason it takes a while for me to come out with stuff is because I'm thinking about it as I go. I had a particularly hard time with this huge chunk of the story because there are many things affecting Rin all at once, and it was a challenge to make sure all those were being addressed but not all in an 'in-your-face' kind of way. Maybe it ended up coming out that way anyway, oh well. I try too hard even when everyone tells me my writing is good enough. I guess it's just one of those things you deal with as a writer lol.**

 **Anyway, I hope you're all having a good time watching these two grow :) please come back for more, and leave a review if you enjoyed, it really helps me to write more!**

 ****By the way, that dumb story about the pretzels and the teacher is all true, sadly. It happened to my sister in her math class, but the difference is my sister is 20-something and this professor was demeaning her like she was a child and...well, it's funny now , but it wasn't when she came home from school that day xD. Just think: whenever you're writing and need some inspiration to make something funny, just look for the things that happen in your life. You might find something there. Anyway, I'll see you all later. I always like to hear from you. *waves***

 **Random short:**

"Rin-senpai!"

Rin let out a yell and scrambled to catch his phone from nearly falling out of his hands. He whirled around to confront the voice which had crept up on him.

"Wh~what the hell?!"

Rin almost didn't recognize him at first, but it was Momo alright. His fiery head was hiding under the enormous brim of a sombrero and his thin form was concealed under a western-looking poncho. He had a thick, black mustache glued to his upper lip and...were those maracas in his hands?

"Momo!" Rin cried, and then reigned in his anger to lower his voice. "What the hell are you doing! Why are you dressed like that?!"

"Heehee, don't I look amazing?" Momo tossed his head from side to side and the little green balls dangling from the brim of his sombrero jiggled. "The international club is having an expo and they were lending out some of their costumes! Teeheehee look at me, soy muy picante hoy! Ariba~!Hahahaha!"

Momo shook his maracas and started prancing in a circle and Rin felt his anger boiling up inside of him.

"Rrrrrmmmm….Momo... Es estupido!"

**Bahahah omg my Spanish is so juvenile xD**


	6. Burns of the First Degree

***~Chapter Six~***

 **Burns of the First Degree**

 **This chapter's mixed tape (a.k.a music I listened to get in the mood):**

I See Fire - Ed Sheeran (Kygo Remix)

Sexual Healing - Marvin Gaye (Kygo Remix)

Glass Animals - Gooey (Don't watch music video, it's fucking weird...)

Firestone - Kygo (Feat. Conrad Sewell)

All We Need - Odesza - In Return (Feat. Shy Girls)

 **I like Kygo, shut up.**

* * *

"He has a temperature of a hundred and three. That's really dangerously up there, you know."

The nurse peeled off his plastic gloves and shot them like a rubber band into the open waste basket across his office.

"It's no surprise he passed out like that after working so hard in a freezing pool."

Rin looked down on the sleeping profile of his best friend, snugly tucked in one of the medical beds of the nurse's office. Rin's vapid eyes shifted themselves to the incessant dripping of the saline solution into the drip chamber. Drip...drip...the hypnotic rhythm had remedied Rin's acute stress from when he first entered the office with his classmates, carrying Sosuke between them like some big dead fish they'd all caught. The harsh, sterile smell of the room was another story, making his stomach queasy.

 _How could I have not noticed how much Sosuke was suffering?_ A spark of anger ignited inside him. _Why didn't that idiot_ say _something to me…?_

The nurse's disinterested voice pulled Rin back from his thoughts.

"If what you're telling me is true, and he's been spending a lot of time walking in the rain lately, then it's very probable he caught something while his body temperature was reduced and his immune system was weakened*."

Rin's mouth hardened. The nurse's words were like a fan feeding a forge's flames, tempering the red-hot blade of Rin's resentment. _You jerk...You were so hell-bent on keeping me out of your business that you took it to this extreme and made yourself sick._

Rin gave a hard swallow and felt his stomach clench.

"Do you think Sosuke will have to go to the hospital? You said his fever is serious, right?"

"Mmmmnn...yes, but I don't think he needs to go to the hospital necessarily. We're giving him fluids and he's finally resting. He needs to recover on his own for now, so just as long as he gets plenty of rest and fluids I think he'll be fine to stay on campus."

Rin relaxed his fists and felt his momentary worry dissipate.

The nurse propelled himself back to his desk on his wheely chair with a single kick, spun around and promptly took up his mountain of paperwork again where he'd left off.

"When he wakes up and feels well enough to walk, you both can head back to your room. You said you were roommates, right?" The nurse turned and connected a serious gaze with Rin over his spectacles. "He'll be mostly in your care. Make sure you help him if he needs it."

Rin returned his statement with a grave nod. "I understand."

"Good." Having fulfilled his hippocratic oath, the nurse turned back to his tedious forms.

After a long stretch of silence, the nurse looked over his shoulder and saw Rin standing in a dismal daze beside Sosuke's bed.

"You know, he might be sleeping for a while. If you leave me your cell number I can give you a call when he wakes up."

"Oh, no, that's all right." Rin heard himself say, and flushed in surprise. "I'll uh...stay here with him."

The nurse simply shrugged and grumbled, "suit yourself" before opening another folder.

In the silence that followed, Rin stole his gaze back onto Sosuke's sleeping form. The brunette's full lips were slightly parted and his broad chest rose and fell rhythmically beneath the light covers. His dark brow looked worried and was coated with a sheen of sweat.

Without even thinking, Rin crossed the room to the sink and, wetting some paper towels with cool water, wrung them until they were damp. Once beside his bed again, Rin smoothed back Sosuke's drenched bangs and pressed the cool rag over his forehead. As he did this his hand brushed against Sosuke's skin, it was so hot Rin drew his hand back in alarm. The swim team captain took a breath to calm himself and sank into the cheap metal fold-up chair next to the bed.

Images from what had happened earlier drifted to the shore of his remembrance, in particular the things that Sosuke had begun to tell him before he passed out.

 _So...rry...hurt..ing...it hurts._

What had he been trying to say?

Rin sighed and leaned back in his chair. Half-lidded, incarnadine orbs silently puzzled over Sosuke's sleeping visage.

 _I wonder what could be so important that you'd go through all this trouble to keep it hidden from me…_

Maybe the reason Sosuke wouldn't open up to him was because he didn't trust Rin enough? That hardly seemed fair, considering how Rin had shared a deeply personal secret with him not that long ago. Sosuke had to know Rin wouldn't just run off and tell anybody about his problems, right?

Rin sighed, _It really isn't like him to be so secretive like this..._

Or was it? Maybe...when it got right down to things...maybe Rin just didn't know Sosuke as well as he thought he did.

They _had_ spent an awful long time apart, and only reconvened just earlier that spring after years of not speaking to each other. They slowly lost all contact during the years they had matured from boys into men.

Rin looked upon Sosuke's face once again, and remembered the surprise he felt when Sosuke told him he was bisexual. That was the first time Rin realized that his childhood Sosuke and _this_ Sousuke might as well have been two entirely different people.

If that was the case...could Rin say that he even knew Sosuke well enough to be _trying_ things with him? Or perhaps that he _truly_ wasn't seeing anyone else?

Rin shook his head, tosseling his fiery locks.

That wasn't even the most disturbing part of this whole thing. At what point had he and Sosuke grown so far apart that Rin didn't even realize he had became a stranger? He and Sosuke used to be inseparable: Exploring shrines, going swimming, hunting for tadpoles, playing dinosaurs and aliens with Gou; they were like pickled ginger and wasabi paste, they went everywhere and did everything together, it was weird to see one without the other. And then...that all changed when Rin moved overseas.

Sosuke used to write to him every other week, but then eventually stopped when he realized Rin wasn't going to write back. Rin hadn't even bothered to visit or give Sosuke a phone call when he returned home every year for New Year's.

 _Look, it's not like I was just avoiding Sosuke, okay?_ Rin tried to justify himself to his inner guilt. _I didn't talk to any of my friend's from Iwatobi either...I didn't want anyone to see me with a broken spirit like that…_ Rin gripped the fabric of his captain's jacket as he remembered his emotional hardships abroad.

 _Well whatever, so it's my fault we had a falling out then. So what? It happens to lots of people all the time for various reasons. There's no use in sitting here feeling sorry for myself over it, it won't change anything...but still…_

Rin's crimson orbs drooped.

 _It...still sucks knowing it's all my fault…_

Before Rin could regress further, Sosuke suddenly began to stir from his slumber.

"Nnmm…" His deep teal eyes fluttered open and his brow furrowed from confusion. He looked to each side, trying to gather his bearings and stopped when he came around to see Rin sitting beside him. Sosuke blinked his eyes, trying to make sense of the whole picture.

"Rin…?"

"...Hey."

Sosuke forced himself into a sitting position, visibly groggy and still lacking color. He rubbed his bloodshot, teal eyes to bring them into focus and he scowled.

"The nurse's office?"

"Yeah. Not sure if you remember, but you passed out in the locker room."

The look of pure shock that registered on his face told Rin that he didn't.

"What…?" Sosuke recoiled, his blue eyes shivering. "Did I...really?"

"Yeah, the nurse says you have a temperature of 103."

Sosuke fell silent and glared down into his lap.

"Were you…" His fingers gripped at the thin sheets. "Did you bring me here?"

"No, I had some of the guys from the swim team help me."

Rin leaned back in his chair and stuffed his hands into his pockets.

"They were all really worried about you…" He glared off at the room's corner as he muttered. " _I_ was really worried about you…"

Sosuke made a noise that sounded pained. "Rin…"

The redhead stood up then and swiftly turned to leave.

"I'll go tell the nurse you're up."

"Wait-"

Something hot and damp caught ahold of Rin's hand just as he was about to walk away. Looking back revealed Sosuke gripping on to him steadfast. His teal eyes looked pained as he forced himself to pick his gaze up and meet Rin's eyes.

"I didn't...I mean…" He let out a sigh and looked away. "I'm sorry..."

Rin blinked, caught off guard by his apology. Then his features reflexively formed into a grimace and he pulled his hand away.

"Just go back to sleep for now, Sosuke." Then he turned and stalked out of the curtained area to the nurse.

* * *

After a brief discussion with the nurse and receiving a list of do's and don't's, the two young men were on their way.

The door to the nurse's office shut behind them with a soft click and Rin let out an audible sigh. For some reason he just found the atmosphere of that place exhausting in and of itself and was glad to be out of there. He cast a glance over towards Sosuke to see how he was fairing. The guy was still dressed in his damp swim trunks from earlier and had nothing on under his swim team jacket.

Sosuke produced an audible groan and clutched his forehead as he staggered some. He made up such a pitiful sight that for a moment Rin forgot to be upset with him.

"C'mon, let's head back."

"Yeah…"

Rin started walking, leaving Sosuke a few paces behind, and stopped when he heard something hit the metal lockers behind him. When he looked back he saw Sosuke had apparently stumbled and had to catch himself against the lockers.

At that moment, the nurse's words from earlier reverberated inside Rin's skull,

 _He'll be mostly in your care. Make sure you help him if he needs it_.

Rin let out yet another sigh and walked back toward his best friend, despite the resentment still simmering in his gut.

"Get over here." He worked himself under Sosuke's arm, draping it over his shoulders.

"What...are you doing?" A hint of irritation tempered Sosuke's tone as Rin wrapped an arm around his waist and brought him closer against his body.

"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm trying to keep you from falling over, idiot."

Sosuke's eyes widened a bit in surprise before his handsome features soured into frown and he turned his face away.

"You're overreacting…" He muttered. "I don't need you to spoon-feed me like this, let go."

Rin silently refused. Despite Sosuke's infrequent griping, he let Rin help him down the halls and to the dormitories without causing a commotion. Sosuke's feverish heat burned through the thin fabric of his jacket and actually made Rin start to sweat where there bodies connected. Despite his raging heat, Sosuke gave a shudder every now and then and his teeth chattered as if he were cold.

Rin only released him when the door to their room clicked shut behind them.

"There." Rin abandoned his hold from Sosuke and peeled his body off from his side. "Now, go grab your things to take a sho _wer_ -!"

Before Rin could completely pull himself away, the brunette quickly wrapped his arms around him and embraced Rin so hard it frightened him. One of his hands cupped the back of Rin's head, threading his fingers through his red hair, to cradle his friend closer into him. The captain's arms hung dumbly by his sides, unsure of what to do.

He tried to step away but Sosuke held him firm, with his sable-brown head resting pathetically in the crook of Rin's shoulder.

"Ngh-Oi!" Rin managed to force out of his constricted diaphragm. "What's your problem?"

"Rin...I…" Sosuke loosened his suffocating hold from Rin and picked his head up out of his shoulder. Rin watched his mouth work to get words out, but nothing came. At last Sosuke pressed his lips together and looked away with the most tortured expression Rin had ever seen on him.

"Sosuke, what's wrong with you?"

"I...I'm sorry." His mouth pulled down in a miserable frown, refusing to say more.

Sorry? Was he apologizing for passing out and making Rin walk him back to the dorm?

"Sosuke, everyone gets sick from time to time. It's not like you could help it..."

Sosuke's expression darkened and he shook his head, still not meeting Rin's gaze. "No...you're wrong…"

His arms wilted away from Rin's sides and he rubbed at his tired eyes, training his handsome face back into a melancholy mask.

"Nevermind, it's nothing."

Rin was beginning to believe Sosuke was delirious on account of his fever. Convinced that was the reason, he stepped around Sosuke to gather his shower materials for him.

"...Well, whatever. Here, here's your towels. Now go take a shower before I break both your knees. I'm tired and want to go to bed already."

"Right, sorry…"

"And make sure you keep the water on cool: not hot, not cold. The nurse specifically said _cool_ or room-temp. The last thing I need is to drag your naked ass out of the shower if you pass out."

The words left Rin's mouth before he really thought about their full effect. Both of them stood in uncomfortable silence, their eyes rounding as the image entered their minds.

"...Uhh…I," Rin spun around and opened their sock drawer, pretending to look for pajamas. "Just get going, would you? It's getting late."

"...All right then."

Rin waited until he heard the door to their adjoined bathroom close behind him before he let out an irritated sigh and passed a hand over his face.

 _The hell is wrong with me? Making shit awkward like that..._

Crossing his arms, Rin leaned back against their desk and glared at their bed bunks. His crimson gaze shifted over to the ladder and images of Sosuke stumbling down the hallway earlier swam to the surface of his memory.

 _There's no way in hell I'm letting that kid climb that ladder tonight_. He sighed. _Guess there's no way around it, I'll have to switch bunks with him…_

The evening gloom and soft pitter patter of the shower next door made the perfect environment to bring all of Rin's simmering contemplations to a boil.

Honestly, Sosuke's behavior was getting ridiculous. Whatever he was hiding from Rin literally drove his friend to the point of collapsing and contracting a dangerous fever. Sure, maybe the fever only happened this one time because Sosuke had been careless, but that wasn't even the heart of the issue. The fact of the matter was there existed a serious doubt of trust between them, and even on the basic level of friendship (no, even between swim captain and teammate) that was considerably detrimental.

Sosuke wasn't going to like it, but Rin was going to confront him again about his behavior. As his friend, roommate, and captain, he had a _right_ to know what was going on.

Rin automatically imagined the worst, like Sosuke was getting mixed up with some bad people outside of school, or worse, what if the idiot was getting into drugs or something? The swim team captain shook his head. When faced with those possibilities, suddenly the idea of Sosuke seeing someone else secretly didn't seem so bad…

With a growl, Rin pushed off the desk, stormed over to the glass slider door and glared out at the rainy darkness beyond. His own angry reflection scowled back at him.

 _Why the hell should I care if Sosuke has someone on the side? Like I said, It's not like we're..._ his face flushed, ' _dating', or doing anything physical together, and I can't expect the guy to go celibate just because I'm not...ready to..._

Not ready? Not ready to what?

Rin ran his fingers through his hair and paced across the room, eyes puzzling at the floor.

 _I thought I already decided I wasn't going to let things hang me up any more. So then...what's my deal?_

Rin bit down on his lower lip and glanced at the bathroom door.

 _Is the reason we're not progressing and doing physical things...just because of me?_

Rin's countenance slowly wrinkled into a expression of bitter spite. He shook his head once more and turned on the overhead light while letting out an irritated sigh.

 _Just...what the hell ever...I shouldn't be made to feel bad about taking things at my own pace._

At that particular moment Rin heard the sound of the shower head screeching off and his thoughts stood to attention. In the silence that followed, Rin began formulating just exactly how to castrate Sosuke verbally. He was anticipating a bloody battle ahead, because if their last attempt at this conversation was any indication, he knew Sosuke was not going to willingly tell him anything.

Rin leaned against the desk once more and waited patiently for the sounds on the other side of the door to stop. Finally, the door popped open and Rin propelled himself off the desk, an inferno lit in his belly, ready to roast Sosuke with his dragon breath.

"Sosuke-"

The door swung open fully and Rin's ferocious flames fizzled out to nothing in his throat.

There Sosuke stood in the doorway...with nothing on but a towel wrapped around his waist.

Water pearled on his olive-tan skin, and slowly dripped down his muscles like honey. His nipples had gone pert from the sudden change in room temperature. The rays of light from the bathroom played off the clouds of steam coiling around him, radiating behind him in shafts of light, giving him the essence of a god emerging from deep slumber. He was tosseling his short, onyx-brown hair dry, flexing his sharp collarbones, and hadn't noticed Rin paralyzed in front of him. Rin knew that he'd seen Sosuke half naked countless times before, and that seeing this should have been nothing new for him but..somehow this time it felt different. Very different.

Once he finished drying his hair, Sosuke's teal eyes peeked open, and upon seeing Rin transfixed in a stupor, his dark brow wrinkled with confusion.

"What?"

Rin floundered for his words.

"Don't _what_ me. Why aren't you dressed?"

Sosuke entered the room, unaware of Rin's discomfort.

"You're the one who forgot to give me clean clothes."

Rin sucked in a breath, automatically wanting to launch a quip, but it died in his throat.

 _Wait...I did?_ He thought back on it. _Ah hell...I did, didn't I?_

"Also, why is it a big deal?"

"Ngh...it isn't." Rin shook his head to align his thoughts. "Anyway, Sosuke, I need to talk to you. I think you owe me an explanation-"

Sosuke wobbled further into the room, and closer into Rin's personal space, making it impossible to continue.

"Oi, Rin." Sosuke's breath smelled like fresh toothpaste, of pleasantly warmed cinnamon. "I've got an idea, why don't you dress me?"

 _...uuhh..._

Forget his face flushing with heat, Rin's whole body suddenly burned in a mortified pyre. He blinked his red orbs, reeling with embarrassment, wondering if he had actually just heard those words come out of his friend's mouth or if he hallucinated.

"S-Sosuke, what the hell are you talking about all of a sudden?!"

"You know," He inched further and Rin inched back. "Why not try it? You've already _un_ dressed me before so…"

Sosuke's voice was low and inviting, but Rin could see from a mile away that his eyes were dull and empty.

"Sosuke," Rin kept his tone even. He was _not_ about to let Sosuke deflect this subject once again with his dripping wet, exposed body. "Quit messing around, I'm serious about this-"

"Here, I'll help you." Completely ignoring him, Sosuke's blunt fingers started to unfold the towel around his hips.

A jolt of fear shot through Rin. His hand flew up to grab Sosuke's wrist before he even had time to think about it.

"Sosuke, seriously, knock it off already! I'm trying to talk to you."

The brunette's eyes widened from shock. Hopefully he was beginning to realize that Rin meant business.

Rin took a deep breath and with great discipline reigned in his thoughts and emotions. He pressed on, very deliberately fixing his gaze at the wall over Sosuke's shoulder.

"You've been acting very strange lately: staying out late, leaving campus without telling anyone, skipping practices: don't think I haven't noticed. For crying out loud, look at what all this is doing to you..."

He gestured toward Sosuke's exposed, shivering form and he couldn't help but feel a flush of embarrassment again from looking at him. His eyes wandered over Sosuke's naked skin, getting lost in the uncharted map of freckles and scars across his arms and abdomen. Rin pulled himself back, blinking rapidly and trying, but failing, to shut out his alluring smell of fresh water, soap, and man.

"Telling me 'I can't tell you, sorry' is...it's not an acceptable answer any more. I deserve to know what's going on with you."

This close, Rin could actually see his skin broken out with goosebumps, and was momentarily torn between forcing the truth out of Sosuke or fulfilling his promise to the nurse to take care of him.

Sosuke let out an irritated growl.

"Fine, if you won't dress me then I'm going to bed naked." He stepped around Rin and headed for the ladder. "I'm freezing and exhausted."

"Wait-hold on! Would you think for a minute?" Rin barred his way. "First off, you're not going up that ladder. Just a second ago you could barely _walk_ down the hallway. You'll fall and crack your skull open, idiot. Secondly..."

Rin glared off into the dark spaces of their room before sighing and finally resting a softer gaze on Sosuke's hunched shoulders.

"You're not going to get better if you don't dress warmly. I can't allow you to go to bed until you're dressed properly."

A silence stretched between them, during which the only sound was the rain tapping against the slider door to the balcony. The space between their bodies was much smaller than it was before, yet as Rin looked into Sosuke's distant, icy glare, he somehow felt farther away than ever. Then Sosuke's low voice shattered the silence.

"...I don't need your permission."

Rin recoiled as if someone had slapped him, then his brows gathered together like dark, angry clouds before a storm.

"...Excuse me?"

Sosuke's expression was like murky water, vague and beguiling. His eyes, now glistening and shivering, told a different story than his face, which was drawn and dark.

"I don't need you breathing down my neck, dictating every little thing I do, or sticking your nose into every cranny of my life." His frosty-teal gaze lifted and cut through Rin like merciless ice daggers. "You think you have the right to know everything about me, but you don't, Rin."

Whatever frail patience Rin had left completely shattered.

"What'd you just say?"

Rin's voice slithered and held as much menace as a serpent scorned. Sosuke stayed silent, his glare steady.

"...You…" Rin shivered with rage. If Sosuke had been wearing any sort of shirt Rin would have grabbed him by the collar and shook him. But as it was he clenched his empty fists so hard his fingernails sank into his flesh, knuckles going white.

"You've been sneaking around, going off to who knows where every other night; you purposely ignore me when I ask about it because I'm genuinely concerned about you _as your friend_ ; and then when you finally broke down I'm the only one who stuck around to take care of your sorry ass. The _least_ you could do is have the decency to own up to what you've been doing and tell me. But no…"

Rin furiously blinked back tears of rage that blurred his vision. He refused to let Sosuke see them and think he was breaking him down.

"...you just play it off like some stupid joke, making half-assed, _empty_ advances at me, then shut me out claiming I'm 'breathing down your neck' when I just want to know what's wrong with you?! Well I'm _done_!" Rin was aware that people in the neighboring rooms could probably hear him by now, but he didn't care.

"I'm done with 'sticking my nose into your life' and caring so much about what you do. Sorry I _ever cared_ , Sosuke...I don't know what's happened to you, but you never used to be like this...Ngh, hell…"

Rin growled through his teeth and wiped at the wetness spilling over onto his cheeks.

"...and you can forget about ' _trying things together'_ or whatever stupid thing you call it." Rin swallowed hard and felt his stomach wretch. "I already told you before I can't do those sorts of things with someone I don't know."

Sosuke's head perked up, his eyes gone dark and round.

"As a matter of fact, until you can man-up and explain your actions, I'm not even speaking to you."

Rin stormed over to their dresser, ripped out a pair of pajamas, and threw them against Sosuke's bare chest.

"Get dressed and go to bed, Sosuke. I'm out of here."

"What?"

Rin didn't even look behind him as he ripped his school bag out of their closet and started stuffing it with a change of clothes and overnight materials.

"Rin-Oi, wait-Rin! Where are you going?"

Rin threw the door open, completely uncaring of the fact that Sosuke was still half naked and someone might see him. With all his stuff tucked under his arm Rin threw his gaze back and connected a seething glare with Sosuke before he hissed,

"Wouldn't that be nice to know?"

before slamming the door close behind him.

* * *

Rin stormed through the sleeping puddles on the vacant sidewalks of downtown Iwatobi, fiery eyes burning through the darkness. The steady rain relentlessly wept down from the thick, heavy clouds up above, making prickling sounds as it shattered against his umbrella.

He let out a sigh that had the weight of an entire mountain, it became a plume of smoke that flew behind him as his breath kissed the cold air. He flicked his wrist over to glance at his watch. It was getting late, 8:15 p.m., but if he hauled ass he might arrive where he was going at an acceptable time. The last bus that could take him across town would arrive in five minutes. Factor that time in, along with the commute, and the short walk, he might arrive within the half hour...

His hand compulsively squeezed his umbrella's rubber handle. Not for the first time, Rin felt guilt stab his gut. Regardless if Sosuke had been a dick or not, he was still very sick and needed someone to take care of him. Rin had forgotten about his solemn pledge to the nurse during the heat of their argument, and now Sosuke was pretty much left to fend for himself…

Rin pulled out his cell phone and unlocked it with one hand. Its bright display cut through the darkness and stabbed his puffy eyes.

He stared at the home screen for a few seconds before he scowled.

 _I don't even know why I'm doing this. I said I was done caring about him…_

His single thumb worked furiously to compose a quick group text to Momo and Nitori explaining that something had come up suddenly with his family and he would be gone for the weekend. In a few brief words he described Sosuke's condition and the parameters for his recovery.

 _Please make sure that idiot drinks water and eats something. And, for the love of god, just make sure he rests. I don't care if you have to sit on him, make sure he doesn't go any where._ _I'll see you soon._

He hit the send button and then turned his phone on silent. He anticipated follow-up text messages demanding to know more information about what Rin's 'family situation' was, or 'IF GOU WAS OKAY OH MY GOD WHAT HAPPENED': He just didn't want to deal with any of that right now…

 _Great, not only did you run out on Sosuke who's deathly ill, but now you're lying to your friends too._

Rin glared down at the cracked sidewalk as his inner conscience castigated him.

 _Whatever_ … _Honestly, even if that guy were to tell me what he's been up to this whole time I probably wouldn't even hear any of it because I'm so pissed at him right now._

He just needed to clear his head after that big argument and let things settle for a bit. Even though he acted rashly by leaving, he figured he and Sosuke spending time apart was exactly what they needed to get their thoughts in order. He just needed to get away, stay the night somewhere else, with someone else. Someone who wouldn't ask questions...

Just then the loud growling of the bus's engine wheeled around the corner of a building and started slithering down the street with its big gleaming eyes reflecting against the wet pavement. It's tires glistened with dirty street water, its brakes screeched and it let out a loud hiss as it came to a slow stop in front of the downtrodden male. With another sigh, Rin pushed his loud thoughts to the back of his mind and climbed onto the last bus for that evening.

* * *

Rin couldn't even remember the last time he'd been properly invited here. The house looked even more intimidating at night, with its dark, empty windows staring at him like the soulless eyes of a fish. The building exuded a feeling of lonesomeness and isolation rather than a retreat.

On his way up the steep steps of the neighborhood, Rin had seen two lights on in the rear, lower level of the home: one in the living room and one in the kitchen. Other than that, viewing the house from the front, no one would guess that anyone was home. Rin nearly felt bad for disturbing the gloomy peace of the manor as he reached up and rang the doorbell.

Rin stepped back and waited in silence for an answer. No noises came from the other side. Rin glanced at his watch with a worried brow and looked at a window on the second floor above the door. The lights were off, so there was no reason to think his friend would be bathing...or maybe he _was_ taking a bath in the dark for all Rin knew. He was kind of enigmatic like that.

Just as he was beginning to wonder if perhaps he was too late in arriving, the sounds of thumping footsteps approaching the door pulled Rin back to the moment.

The house's front door slid open and the owner blinked his blue, crystalline eyes in surprise.

"...Rin?"

"Hey, evening, Haru."

He saw Haru's piercing azure eyes shift over the bag which was slung over his shoulder. Haruka's slender brows met in the middle of his face in a mixture of confusion and concern.

"What are you doing here?"

Rin let out a reflexive chuckle.

"What kind of greeting is that? I haven't talked to you in weeks and that's the best I get?"

Haru kept Rin fixed in place with his sharp eyes, silent and unmoving.

Finally, Rin gave under the pressure, his half-smile fading and he looked away while scratching the back of his head.

"...I get you, though. I understand how this looks: It's really late for me to just show up unexpectedly." Rin let out what must have been the millionth sigh that evening.

"Look...all you need to know is me and Sosuke had it out earlier tonight...really bad. I just need some time away from the whole place to let my head cool down. So, I guess what I'm asking is can I stay over tonight?"

Haru continued to observe Rin, his hooded blue orbs shivering as they deciphered. Eventually Haru sighed through his nose and turned back into his house, but left the door open behind him.

"Well, I guess you'd better come in."

Rin's shoulders relaxed as he released a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.

"Thank you…"

As soon as Rin stepped inside and heeled off his shoes in the genkan, he was enveloped in the warm, refreshing smell of grilled fish. Rin was just noticing Haru was wearing an apron and carrying a ladle as he walked back into his kitchen.

Rin dropped his soaking umbrella in a large pot near the door.

"Sorry, did I catch you in the middle of dinner?" He called after Haru, who retreated into the back room.

"No. Just making a lunch for tomorrow. Go ahead and sit down."

Rin did as he was told and wheeled into Haru's living room. He gratefully sank down onto the tatami mats, shouldered off his heavy bag, and got close to the low table. A pleasant breeze rolled in through the open slider door from the porch and kissed his damp skin; the sweet peeling of a wind chime from outside sang sweetly in opposition against the droning rain.

All of the stress and loneliness Rin had previously felt outside completely vanished once he settled into this calm, warm, domestic setting. Even though he hadn't been to Haru's house in…god, in years, he still felt comfortably at home. He let out a small breath and rested against the table. This was just what he needed…

A small movement near the porch caught his eye. A pair of green eyes peered at Rin from a wet, fury, orange face, hovering above a saucer of milk. The creature was a small cat, seeking refuge from the rain on Haru's porch. The feline licked its whiskers before turning its attention back to drinking. Rin gave a small smile and tried to coax the kitty closer, only to be ignored.

Rin groaned and leaned his cheek into his palm as his stomach churned with hunger. The delicious smells from the kitchen twisted his stomach into knots. It wasn't until just then that Rin remembered he hadn't eaten anything since before practice earlier that day.

As if in answer to his prayers, Haru rounded into the living room holding a tray of brown drinks and snacks. A phrase Nagisa told him once popped into his mind then: 'not all heros wear capes, Rin-chan'. Rin nearly wept with gratitude on the sight of the delicious food.

"Iced tea's fine?"

"Yes, it's perfect. Thanks for the food."

Rin knew it was rude to boldly indulge on a host's hospitality, but his hunger made it difficult for him to eat the offered snacks at a polite pace. As much as he tried to slow himself down, it was clear Haru noticed his gusto, watching him eat with a single brow arched.

A tense silence stretched between the two which consisted of Rin stuffing his face and Haru watching him do it. Rin was thankful at least the rain was filling in the empty space, otherwise the silence would have been a bit too awkward to be comfortable. Well, Rin _had_ decided to go there because he wasn't in the mood to recite everything that just happened, and it was a known fact that Haru wasn't much of a talker. Even still, his intense blue stare was a little unsettling.

"...Look," Haru began at last. "I don't mind if you stay the night tonight, but I have business to do in the morning so you should probably leave then."

Rin chased down the last of the snacks with a gulp of iced tea. He expelled a hearty breath and wiped his mouth on the back of his hand.

"Business?" Rin regarded his friend with a wrinkled brow. Since when did Haru go out of his way to associate himself with others? "What's that mean exactly?"

Rather than give Rin an explanation, Haru turned his stare out to the open porch and took a drink of his iced tea.

"Nothing, really." It appeared the stoic swimmer had nothing else to add to the matter, as he kept his eyes and expression closed.

"Well...all right, leaving tomorrow morning shouldn't be a problem." More silence lapsed between them. Rin took a swig of his drink, trying to think of something to talk about. The more distraction the better.

"...How have the guys been?"

"Hn?"

"You know: Rei and Nagisa? I haven't seen them in a while, about just as long as I haven't seen you."

"Rei's the same as he's always been. Nagisa's been rambunctious lately. We're all waiting for his new meds to kick in."

Rin chuckled despite himself.

"And what about Makoto?"

Suddenly, Haru's handsome, indifferent face looked stricken.

"What?"

"Makoto. How has he been?"

"Oh. He's…" Haru pressed his lips together and stared down into his cup, the tips of his fingers gripping it going white.

"...He's fine."

The silence that followed was more tense than usual, which made it all the more confusing. Rin's eyes wandered as he continued to think of more things to talk about. He forgot just how tight-lipped Haru was. Rin's orbs came to rest on the digital clock over by the tv. It was almost 9 o'clock.

"...It's getting kind of late. You tired at all?"

Haru simply shrugged his shoulders.

"Not really, but we can head to bed now if you want."

Rin helped Haru gather the mess, then collected his belongings while he waited for Haru to return from the kitchen.

"This way." The solemn swimmer murmured and began ascending the stairs to the second level of the home, not even casting his glance behind him to see if Rin followed. Pieces of the house groaned under their steps as they climbed the stairs, much like the joints of an ancient animal. Other than that, the entire place was silent. Rin felt some of that gloomy loneliness return to him as they made their way into the dark upstairs.

A question had been tempting Rin since he sat with Haru in the living room. He'd refrained from asking because it might have been a sensitive subject, but with Haru being so reserved he left Rin hardly any choice.

"Your parents aren't home?"

"No. They both work far from home during most days of the week. They'll be home for the summer soon."

"Ah…"

Rin seemed to remember them not being home very much. Maybe that's why Haru was such a solitary person. This place seemed very lonely and gloomy to Rin, but if that's the way Haru grew up then it made sense why he didn't seem bothered by it at all.

More silence as they walked down the hallway and into Haru's room. Rin's red eyes ran around the room, wondering if anything would look familiar after all this time. Obviously Haru had changed the decor between now and then, and his furniture had been rearranged as well. A part of him smiled as he noticed the small details that hadn't changed, like the dolphin posters above his desk or the picture of their old swim team during their elementary school days.

Rin set his stuff down and removed his baseball cap as Haru pulled something white and fluffy out from under his bed.

"Thanks again for letting me stay over. Ah, I almost forgot, mind if I take a shower?"

"Sure. Towels are in the changing room**. You remember where it is?"

"Yeah, thanks." Unzipping his backpack, Rin retrieved his bag of toiletries and headed to the bath.

Rin slid the door to the changing room close behind him and made quick work of turning on the shower, fixing it at a temperature before undressing so the water could warm up.

He pulled off his clothes and opened up his toiletry bag to retrieve his soap...and frowned. There among his toothpaste, toothbrush, and comb was his bottle of vitamin powder.

... _God damn it..._

After traveling half an hour across town and isolating himself in his old friend's house, Rin was convinced he wouldn't have to think about his troubles in anyway. But there fate was again, throwing his problems right back in his face, it simply wouldn't allow him to forget about his miseries for a single minute.

Rin took the bottle out of his bag and glared at the tiny print on the back. If he and Sosuke hadn't gone shopping that day he never would have gotten into this mess. He was just fine before this powder came into his life, precious as his time improvements might be. He never used to question what it was he wanted or what satisfied him, he barely even had urges. Now everything was so confused: Frustrating urges burned inside of him, just barely suppressed, like a glowing hot furnace with its door busted open and the flames licking out; and worst of all, his friendship with Sosuke was now being brought into question...

Rin's red eyes glanced over to the empty waste basket next to the washing machine, and suddenly it was as if the bottle turned to lead in his hand, weighing down so heavy. He bit down hard on his lip, his fingers digging into the hard plastic…

Rin threw the cursed thing back in his toiletry bag and stormed off to the shower room.

* * *

Rin returned to Haru's room to find the teen reading a magazine on his bed. In the time it took for him to shower and change into his pj's Haru had set up a futon for Rin to sleep on next to his bed on the floor.

Haru's raven-black head perked up at the sound of his bedroom door sliding open and shut.

"All done?"

"Yeah. So," Rin stretched his arms over his head. "What'dya wanna do?"

Haru closed his magazine and sat up.

"Nothing, I just figured we'd go to bed; I have to get up early, anyway."

"Fine by me." Rin was grateful to have an excuse to quit the night early. That day felt like it had been a thousand hours long, both emotionally and physically exhausting. The sooner he got to sleep the sooner he could put this whole thing from his mind.

Haru turned off the overhead light and they both got settled into bed. Rin's head felt dense as it sank into the plush pillow, weighed down by oppressively heavy thoughts.

Rin at least welcomed the silence that washed over them this time. He closed his eyes and tried to let the rain tapping against the roof lull him to sleep.

"...Rin."

A soft voice called from above him and turned his head towards Haru. The bright screen display of his phone lit up his indifferent face as he scrolled through pages on some website with food pictures.

"What?"

"Was it really that bad?"

Rin's brow furrowed.

"What are you talking about?"

"The fight you had with Yamazaki?"

Rin felt anxiety pierce through him like a giant icicle. He hadn't expected Haru to ask anything about it. Usually the solitary swimmer didn't try to make other people's business his business, but Rin supposed he should have figured Haru would ask _something_ , considering the cryptic explanation he gave earlier.

"It seemed to me like you two are close friends, is all. It must have been really bad if you can't even be in the same building as him."

Rin bit down on his lower lip and clenched at his sheets.

"I know what you mean. Sosuke and I are naturally competitive people, so we get into petty arguments all the time. But this time it's different, he's being all secretive about something and refuses to tell me anything."

"Isn't it fine if he has a private life?"

"It isn't when he's making himself sick!" Rin's response came out more heated than he intended and instantly felt guilty upon looking up and seeing Haru's confused face staring back at him.

"...Sorry."

"What do you mean by making himself sick?"

"Look," Rin sighed. "I'd rather not get into it right now. All you need to know is Sosuke's been acting really shady and made himself sick as a result. By not telling me anything he's seriously insulting my trust." Rin didn't mention anything about ending their...agreement?, to try new things together. There was no way in hell was Rin going to open that can of worms.

"I…" Rin turned his face away to glower across the room. "I'm coming to realize I don't know anything about him when I thought I knew everything…"

"I'd say you're overreacting, if you ask me." Haru's deadpan response made Rin recoil. His friend continued, unhindered. "Then again, I don't know everything that happened. However…"

Haru's voice grew cheerless and his phone tilted downwards as his clear blue eyes frowned into the darkness above his bed. "It doesn't matter how long you've known someone or how much time you've spent with them. There will always be things they keep from you. You can never completely know everything about them…"

There was something in the way Haru mumbled that last part that made Rin think there was more behind what he was saying.

"Well...anyway, maybe Yamazaki is thinking the same thing about you."

Rin blinked.

"Me?"

"Mmn. When you came back to Japan all of us were so surprised at how much you'd changed."

"Tch, I'm not all that different...but maybe you're right. I guess I haven't really been considering how all this has been making Sosuke feel..."

Rin remembered the crushing embrace Sosuke closed him in after they'd walked back from the nurse's office, and his wavering voice and torn expression as he said,

 _I...I'm sorry_.

 _Idiot, if you're really that sorry then why not just tell me?_ Nothing about Sosuke was clearing up. If anything, Rin was only becoming more confused…

Haru locked the screen to his cell phone and turned over onto his side, plunging the room into dusk.

"I'm tired, I'm going to bed now. Night."

"Yeah. Night." Rin closed his eyes and felt his shoulders relax. That whole conversation, which he thought wouldn't even happen in the first place, had put him on edge. Rin was thankful that he and Haru had somehow simultaneously reached a point in the discussion where neither one of them wanted to carry on.

Rin turned over on his side and tried his best to push his loud thoughts to the back of his mind. At the very least, it was comforting to know that he wasn't the only one with friendship issues.

* * *

 ****Most traditional shower rooms in Japan actually consist of two connecting rooms. The first is a sort of changing room where a person is supposed to get dressed and undressed, and I'm guessing this is also where towels are kept too (?).**

 ***Okay, before any of you say anything, I KNOW my reason for Sosuke contracting a fever doesn't make sense; a person can't catch a fever just from being cold. Whatever :p Sosuke got sick because I needed him to, so there.**

 **Also, let me just go ahead and apologize for what must be the** _ **driest and boringest**_ **part of this chapter at Haru's house. Hopefully y'all weren't expecting anything juicy to happen there cuz it didn't. It was really difficult for me to write Haruka because I never really spent that much time studying his mannerisms as much as I do Sosuke and Rin's. I hope I didn't write him too out of character, because I simply just don't have the time (or the want) to go back and rewatch episodes I've watched umpteen times to get into his persona. Especially now that I have two jobs and am working 6-7 days a week - yyyyeaaaah, that's why it took me so long to post this small chapter. Sorry babes.**

 **Aaaaaaaanywhosers, next chapter's gonna be lit. You guys will finally be getting all that fluff you've been waiting for. So stick around if you wanna see some hot SouRin action. Oh yeah, and leave a comment if you enjoy this story, or something (it'd make me feel better about myself at least lololololol *cries*)**

 **See y'all next time!**

 **P.S. what'd you think of the "mixed tape" for this chapter? I thought it was pretty awesome, I wonder if anyone listened to those songs xD**

 **Random shorts:**

"I…" Rin turned his face away to glower across the room. "I'm coming to realize I don't know anything about him even though I thought I knew everything…"

Rin patiently waited for some sort of reply, but none came. He looked back over at Haru to gauge his expression. Haru was staring at his phone's screen with shivering blue orbs. Since they were both lying on their backs Rin could actually see what was on his screen from his position on the floor if he strained his eyes.

Haru appeared to be scrolling through some blog with pictures of cheerful, cartoon anthropomorphic fish characters...

"So cool…" Haru whispered.

Rin blinked his incarnadine orbs.

"...Are you...seriously on tumblr looking at pictures of Finding Dory while I'm trying to talk to you right now?"

Haru's brow wrinkled before he rolled on to his side, effectively barring Rin's sight.

"No, shut up."

He was totally on tumblr.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Rin unabashedly stared into Sosuke's deep cerulean eyes. He smirked and leaned his cheek into his fist, swirling his coffee around in his cup.

"Hn...damn, babe. You got some killer baby-blue's. They're sexy as hell."

Sosuke finished taking a swig of his coffee and matched Rin's smirk with one of his own.

"Ah, a compliment coming from you? That's pretty rare. I guess I'll have to just…" He flicked on dark sunglasses and crossed his arms. " _Teal_ with it."

Rin's smirk soured into a frown.

"...I just remembered I have to be some where. Bye."


	7. Burns of the Second Degree

**Hey guys, below is the mixed tape for this chapter. But this time I wanted to try a little something different. Instead of just telling you which songs I listened to, I put little asterisks next to some of the songs and paired them to different parts of the story to enhance the mood. So when you're reading the story and come across some stars go to youtube and listen to that song while you read that part (if you want to, you don't have to). I was a little against it before because I thought doing this would interrupt your flow of reading or break immersion but maybe the music will make it even better. Those of you who do try it let me know how it affects your experience :)**

 **This chapter's mixed tape:**

*The Ocean - Mike Perry (Feat. Shy Martin)

**Phaeleh Afterglow (feat. Soundmouse)

***Faded - Alan Walker

****Night Keys - Satin Jackets

Kings of Summer - Ayokay (feat. Quinn XCII)

Big Wild - Aftergold (feat. Tove Styrke)

I Took a Pill in Ibiza - Mike Posner

Bonobo Black sands Kiara

Midnight City - M83 (careful, the video's another weird one…)

* * *

 ***~*~Chapter Seven~*~***

 **Burns of the Second Degree**

When Rin awoke the next morning he was greeted by a miserable, grey sky. It was sprinkling, just enough to ruin any possibility of having a pleasant day.

He sat up to stretch and greet Haru a good morning, but the teen wasn't in his bed. His sheets were neatly made up, and Rin noticed the door was left open. Before he could even begin to wonder where his friend might be, the pleasant aroma of breakfast floating through the air aroused his sluggish stomach. Rin went downstairs to find a hot, delicious homemade breakfast of rice, salmon, and omelets waiting. The somber captain gratefully indulged.

After Rin helped clean everything up from breakfast, he got himself ready for the day and gathered all of his belongings. Likewise, Haru prepared himself for the day he had ahead: he wore a navy blue raincoat, a pair of blue boots to match, and a...plastic pail?...just what kind of 'business' did he have today?

As they approached the door, Haru checked his friend with an apprehensive glance up and down, as if _he_ were the one who were dressed conspicuously.

"Right, you have everything then?"

"Yeah, I think so. Thanks again for letting me stay the night here. I owe you one." Rin lifted his fist and held it there expectantly with a smile.

Haru blinked in surprise, then looked away, embarrassed.

"Jeez, you still do things like this…?" He lightly bumped Rin's fist all the same.

"Okay then, I'll be leaving now. See ya."

"Yeah, bye."

Rin slipped on his sneakers, opened the door...and nearly stumbled backwards. Right as he'd opened the door, someone else on the other side had raised their fist to knock on it and nearly bashed him in the face. He didn't see who it was at first because his reflexes took over, but once he got his bearings…

*"Nagisa?"

"Oooh? It's Rin-chan?!" The blonde blinked his bubbly pink eyes in surprise. He looked like a ray of much needed sunshine in his vibrant, yellow raincoat.

"What's Rin-san doing at Haruka-senpai's house?"

A voice from further in front spoke up. Rin peered around Nagisa's petite form and saw Makoto and Rei standing behind him. They both looked just as surprised to see Rin and were wearing dark green, and dark purple raincoats respectively.

"Rin…?" Makoto stepped closer under the eave of the house to get out of the rain. "...this is a surprise, what're you doing here?" His green gaze glanced between Rin and Haru.

The glance connected with Haru like electricity; the solitary swimmer jolted and quickly turned his crystalline orbs to frown at the ground.

A silence went through the small crowd as they all felt the residual static between their two friends.

"D'uuuh, I...just meant, we didn't know Haru would be having anyone over." Makoto scrambled to dispel the suddenly awkward silence. "We wouldn't have come so early..."

Rin's crimson orbs flickered over the rest of them and noticed that they all were carrying colored pails like Haru was.

"What are you guys even doing today anyway?"

"Aaahaa~~! We're hunting for salamanders!"

"Yes!" Rei pushed up his glasses and stood with a very dignified posture. "We are going to collect samples for our group biology project! Our purpose is to observe their behaviors. Given that this specific species of salamander is only active during points in the day where temperatures are in the low-humid range, early morning conditions present the most probable-"

"It's been raining all week and we haven't been able to do anything!" Nagisa interjected Rei's long-winded rambling with a pathetic sob. "We haven't even been able to practice our exchanges in the pool! Uggggh...I've been soooo boooored…"

A pregnant pause enveloped them.

"Hunting for salamanders…?" He turned towards Haru with a hooded glare. "That's the ' _business'_ you were talking about last night?"

Haru turned his flat stare out into the grey morning.

"That's what you were so secretive about?"

"You're sure making a big deal out of it."

"I'm not ' _making a big deal out of it_ '! You made it seem like you had legitimate business!"

"Wait!" Nagisa interjected. "If Rin-chan's here this early, does that mean he's coming with us?"

"Haa?"

"That's an excellent idea! With another set of eyes we can increase our chances of capture even more!"

"Please, Rin-chan! Come with us!" Nagisa adorably tugged at his hand, at which the redhead recoiled. "It'll be so much fun with you there! It'll be just like old times!"

"Nagisa…" Makoto chided behind him. "You can't just force Rin to do things you want. What if he has plans of his own?"

"Well...actually…" Rin's fingers dug into his backpack strap. "I...I guess I don't really have any plans for today."

"Then would you want to come with us?"

When Rin looked into Nagisa's face again his rosey eyes were sparkling, practically begging him.

Rin gave it some thought for a moment.

"Well...I guess I don't have anywhere to go. Okay…" He even allowed himself a half smirk and a 'hf'.

"Normally I have more important things to do, but since this is a free weekend you can count me in, it sounds like fu-wha! Oi!"

"Yaaaay!" Nagisa glomped onto his grumpy, redheaded friend. "Ahahaha, Rin-chan's coming hunting with us!"

Rin heard Haru let out a small sigh behind him and walked back into his house.

"I'll go get an extra raincoat…"

* * *

"Rin-chan, come jump in the puddles with me!"

Nagisa hopped to-and-fro into the cloudy puddles like a happy, yellow bouncy ball.

"Oi! Watch where you're splashing!"

Rin darted out of the way, even though he was perfectly protected in his black raincoat and boots. His tone was reproachful, but he shamelessly wore a toothy grin from ear to ear as he splashed Nagisa back.

It was surprising how walking down a dirt road on a rainy day with his friends could do so much for his state of mind, to put him at ease. Rin felt slightly guilty when he thought of all the issues he was putting off, but on second thought he smashed that guilt over its head and buried it deep in the muck of his mind. He would not allow himself to feel sorry for taking time away from his difficulties. He just needed some time away.

Rei and Nagisa did an excellent job of distracting him with their humorous banter; scientific and audaciously enthusiastic, they complemented each other like dumplings and soy sauce. Their presence was both nourishing and enjoyable.

Haru lead the way in front, apparently knowing the route to the ideal salamander habitat, but strangely...instead of his best friend taking up his side like usual, Haru walked alone.

Rin cast his gaze behind him and saw Makoto taking up the rear, his silver-green eyes downcast on the muck and his hands stuffed in his pockets. He looked up and caught Rin staring and quickly morphed his features into a lonely but warm smile.

Before Rin could even begin to contemplate it, something dense collided hard into his lower back. He whipped around to see mud trailing down his backside and Nagisa retreating with sludgy fingers.

"NAGISAAA!"

Deciphering the situation would have to wait, it was time to get revenge. By the time Rin was done with him, Nagisa's yellow raincoat was going to be brown.

More laughter and screams ensued until finally Haru came to a stop in front of a worn dirt pathway cutting through waist-high grass.

"Here, this way." The path lead them down a steep hill and into a wood with rich soil. A thick layer of soft, wet leaves covered every inch of the forest floor. All of the trees were thoroughly soaked, making the ghostly green moss clinging to their dark bark look like it was creeping and alive.

"Whaa...it's so big out here." Nagisa sighed as he admired the underside of the canopy. His breath came out in a cloud of smoke. "Where should we start looking first, Rei-chan?"

"Well…" Rei pulled out a pamphlet from the breast pocket of his coat. "The brochure I got from the local wildlife center says that salamanders commonly live under rotting logs or rocks, but it also says they can live in small streams as well."

"How did you guys want to do this?" Rin asked. "Should we split in pairs or all search separate-"

"D'aaaahhh, me and Rei-chan will start looking for logs! This way, Rei-chan!"

"Hn? Whaa-! N-Nagisa-kun!"

Nagisa suddenly grabbed a hold of Rei's arm and began sprinting away in the other direction, dragging the poor butterfly behind him at a break-neck pace, leaving the other three behind in a stunned silence.

"Well, I guess that settles it." Rin casually crossed his arms behind his head. "Guess we'll be hunting for salamanders together…"

Rin trailed off as he took a good look at his two friends. They were neither looking at him or at each other, and both looked as if someone were pinching them.

"...What's up with you two?"

"Eh?"

"Nothing's wrong..." Haruka mumbled, yet he still refused to look either one of them in the eye.

Rin simply arched a red brow.

"...Anyway. Rei and Nagisa said they were going to look for logs, so why don't we try to find a stream and hunt there?"

"Sure."

"Yeah, that sounds like a good idea."

**They began walking further into the woods, the only sound between them being the crunching of leaves and twigs beneath their boots.

"Ah, so Rin," Makoto broke the stalemate after a few minutes of insufferable silence. "It's rare to see you with a day off. Hopefully you're not working yourself too hard at the academy?"

"Well, you know how it is, being captain yourself and all. You can't slack off even in the slightest because as soon as you do everyone thinks you have no place to tell them to work harder."

Makoto chuckled.

"That certainly is true. I don't think I've missed a practice at all since becoming captain last year...nnnn...these woods sure are beautiful at this time of year."

"Yeah, they are. Come to think of it-" Rin choked around the words in his throat, then scowled into the trees.

"Nnn? Rin?"

"Ugh...nothing...all I was going to say was me and...Sosuke used to spend a lot of time around here when we were kids…"

"Aaah, what a coincidence! Haru and I would play in these same woods when we were younger too. Isn't that right, Haru?"

For the first time that day, Makoto turned to speak to Haru directly...but he wasn't there.

"Hn?"

"Ehh? Haru?"

They looked around in every direction, but saw no sign of their friend's dark blue raincoat.

"What the hell? Where did he run off to?" Rin's incarnadine orbs flickered over the thin trunks of white birch trees. "Why would he just take off like that all of a sudden?"

Makoto didn't try to offer an excuse, instead glaring at the forest carpet like it would provide an answer. Finally, he picked his gaze off the ground and stared ahead with determination.

"Well, it's never a good idea to be completely alone by yourself in the woods. Since Haru never carries his cell phone on him...I think we should split up and search for him."

"Huh?" Rin arched a brow. "That doesn't really make much sense: didn't you just say it's a bad idea to be by yourself in the woods?"

"Aaah…" Makoto gave a sheepish smile and scratched the back of his head. "Right, but at least we have cell phones, so we can call for help if we need it, right?"

"Yeah, I guess that's true…" Rin still had his cell phone, but had completely forgotten about it since he'd turned it off last night…

"Anyway, I'll start searching back that way. Why don't you start searching in that direction?"

"Man, what a pain." Rin sighed. "Here I was thinking we were going to have fun catching a ton of salamanders, but Haru's too busy being 'free', or whatever nonsense he calls it."

Makoto smiled and chuckled despite himself.

"Yeah. All right, I'll start looking this way then."

"Right. Text me when you find him so I can chew him out properly."

The males then turned their separate ways and went crunching further into the woods.

The rain continued to sprinkle down and prickled over the hood of Rin's raincoat. The sound blended together with steady crashing of rain on the treetops and his feet snapping through the underbrush, putting him in a sort of trance.

 _Something about those two seems off today_.

Rin pondered while his red eyes scoured the forest for his friend. Rin remembered Haru's pinched expression when he asked about Makoto at dinner last night, and wondered what on earth could have happened between them to make them so cold like that. It was true Haru could be a difficult person to get along with, but Makoto was so mild, usually they never fought about anything…

"Ugh…"

Speaking of fighting with one's friends…

 _I'll have to turn my cell phone on now, even though I really don't want to..._

The last thing Rin wanted was to look at unread text messages and voicemails from his Samezuka family when he was trying to spend time away from the whole issue. But it couldn't be helped, he needed to be able to communicate with Makoto…

Rin came to a stop and pulled his phone out of his pocket. His stomach clenched as he held down the power button and waited.

 _There, it's on._

Before he could shove the damned thing back in his pocket to forget about it, several notifications avalanched down his screen:

 _(1) missed call and voicemail from Aichiro N._

 _(5) text messages from Momo M._

 _(2) missed calls and voicemails from Momo M._

And….

 _(1) missed call and voicemail from Sosuke Y._

Rin's expression, and likewise his good mood, soured immediately.

 _Does that idiot seriously think he can apologize to me behind the screen of his cell phone?_ He made a disgusted noise in the back of his throat, shoved his phone back in his pocket, and stormed onwards. _If Sosuke has something to say to me, he can say it to my face._

Rin resumed his search in earnest, determined to put the matter from his mind before it could make him any angrier.

"Haru…!" His voice reverberated off the thin trees as it fled into the empty, misty wood. The only response that came was the crashing of rain on the canopy.

Rin's irritation flared.

"Haaa...for crying out loud, how is he even supposed to hear me when the rain is making all this noise?"

They were in search of a stream at the time Haru split away from him and Makoto. Maybe he went to look for water somewhere? When Rin thought about it that way, suddenly the idea of Haru running away on his own didn't seem so out of character.

Rin decided a stream would be the best place to start looking. If he remembered correctly there should have been a stream not too far from where he was.

He strained his ears to listen for rushing water. It was a bit difficult with all the noise going on, but Rin headed further into the woods where he thought he could hear a gurgling creek. As he headed closer towards the sound, the trees got closer together, and their branches hung much lower, making it difficult to go forward.

"Agh...the hell…" Rin growled, wondering why in the hell he didn't stick with Nagisa and Rei in the first place.

At last, he came to a point where the forest floor yielded to the shore of a small stream. Its silvery voice babbled in the air over the winding, liquid serpent.

Rin looked both ways, but saw no sign of his friend. He let out a growl, and was just about to start heading downstream when a loud noise and flurry of movement further ahead made him duck back behind the trees. Rin wasn't sure if it was an animal or a stranger, but while he was out in the woods by himself he knew he had to be cautious.

As the noises got closer, they became clearer: they were voices.

"...ru, Haru! I said _wait!_ "

"Let _go_ , Makoto!"

Rin peeked his red orbs around the side of tree he was hiding behind. Sure enough, there he saw his two friends a short distance away. Haru had his back towards Rin and...for some reason wasn't wearing his rain coat? He was completely drenched from the rain which made his white Oxford shirt cling to his body. His peach and alabaster skin showed through the fabric where it stuck, his sharp shoulder blades and back muscles tantalizingly visible.

Makoto had been chasing after him and caught ahold of Haru by his wrist. Makoto's handsome face looked wounded but he hadn't let go of Haru.

Rin supposed he could intervene but...it looked like he was finally about to get some honest answers about what had transpired between his friends.

"Why can't you just answer me?" Makoto's tone was nearly pleading. "I already told you I'd respect your answer either way. I..." The teen bit down on his lower lip, his olive orbs glistening.

"...I'm sorry to burden you with my feelings like this, but with me leaving for college in Tokyo, I couldn't leave without telling you how I felt. I tried to give you space to think things through but...the more I think about it, I just don't understand what you mean by 'you need time to decide'. I mean, shouldn't it be obvious?" Makoto's mouth frowned ever so slightly. "Either you have feelings for me or you don't."

 _Whoa...what?!_

Haru yanked his arm out of Makoto's hold.

"I won't let you force me into making a decision, Makoto. You're being unfair."

"I am _not_." His voice quivered. "I've been _more than fair_ to you in all this. It's _you_ who's being unfair by avoiding this entire situation, treating me like I don't exist."

Haru's expression wrinkled as if he'd seen a small, helpless animal in pain. He averted his eyes from his best friend. Rin was unable to tell if it was just rain trailing down Haru's cheeks now.

Makoto started again, first taking a shallow breath to calm himself.

"I promise whatever your answer is I'll respect it, and I won't let it compromise our friendship. I…" His voice faltered, then softened. "I just want to continue to be by your side, if nothing else, but if you really can't stand my being there anymore, I," he swallowed.

"I promise I'll stay away from now on if that's what you want...But I need an answer, Haru. A definite answer, because as much as I love you I'm not going to hold myself back. I have enough respect for myself to know when to move on..."

For a moment, the only sound that passed between them was the soft whispering of the rain crinkling over the canopy and the gurgling stream. Then another, soft sound came, more reserved than even the shy rain.

"You...you've always been such a pain…"

Makoto's face rounded in confusion and hurt.

"...What?"

"There were a lot of times during our friendship, Makoto, when I wondered why you continued to stay friends with me. Back when we first met in grade school, I didn't have any friends. I was completely alone and didn't mind things being that way. A lot of times I still feel that way…"

Rin watched a small tremor of hopelessness ripple across Makoto's face, but Haru continued, surprising the both of them.

"And there you were: a nice kid that got along with everyone, you could easily have left me alone when I brushed you off and went to play with anyone else...but…" Haru finally turned his sight back to his best friend. His suffering lapis eyes told Makoto what his stoic face would never betray.

"Like water, even though I pushed you away, you still flowed back to me, despite everything I did…" His deep pools dropped the ground and his hands curled into fists.

"If anything, the harder I tried to put distance between us, the kinder you were towards me and...eventually I thought, 'what if this isn't so bad...what's the harm in letting him like me?'" His eyes closed. "From that moment on you've always been there, and...now I often think you understand me better than anyone else…"

"H...Haru…" Makoto's voice was barely audible.

"That's why when you told me you had feelings for me I was shocked, but...at the same time, I sort of wasn't. To constantly stay by my side regardless of other interesting people around, I suspected there had to be reason. I didn't allow myself to jump to conclusions, but...maybe what I was really doing was trying not to think about what would happen if that were true. Would I like you back? If I didn't, then what sort of person would I like? I...never really thought of myself being with _anyone_ ," Haru's azure eyes grew distant.

"Male or female: none of it really interested me. You wanted an answer from me...but…" Haru's slender face darkened as conflicting ideas clashed behind his quivering orbs. "I don't even know what it is I want, or if I want _anything_ at all. I…" His hands clenched to fists at his side.

"All I know is I want you to stay with me the way you always have. I…" Shimmering blue searched for silvery green. "I don't want to imagine life without you being there."

"Haru…" Makoto's shoulders slumped as he sighed, looking defeated but notably relieved. "That's not an answer at all. I already told you that regardless if you felt the same way or not I would still be friends with you. You're not answering the more important question."

"Sorry...Makoto, the fact that I can't make up my mind has nothing to do with you, I just...don't know what it is I want in general because I never thought about it." Haru's eyes narrowed and his mouth squashed into a miserable frown. "And it doesn't make things any less confusing that it's you."

"Me? What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean…"

They both fell silent as mutual understanding flashed between them: the fact that he was Haru's best friend.

"Well…" Makoto's voice was small. "What if I k-" his voice caught in the back of his throat and he coughed nervously. He started over, his words careful and measured. "What if I kissed you?"

Haru and Rin both drew in a breath.

"What?"

 _What!_

Haru instinctively took a step back, but Makoto wasn't about to let him escape, taking a bold step forward for every one Haru took back.

"I mean...you said you can't answer because you've never thought about what you want. But if you tried kissing me don't you think you'd be able to figure it out?"

"That's...I don't…" Rin watched Haru tragically back himself up against a tree, unable to say anything without giving his position away. Haru's head whipped behind him, then back in front, eyes alight with trepidation.

Makoto took one last step so that there was only about an inch of space between their rainboots. Haru's eyes rounded and both he and Rin simultaneously drew in a soft breath as Makoto raised a hand and trailed his knuckles down one side of his best friend's face.

It might have just been the rain and the fact that he was drenched to the bone, but Rin definitely saw Haru shiver.

"Makoto, this doesn't-"

"Haru…" those tanned fingers stopped beside his mouth and Makoto's thumb stroked just the corner of Haru's slightly parted lips.

Haru watched with wide blue eyes, his body apparently petrified like the dead birch tree he was pressed against. His peach-colored chest visible through his shirt rose and fell in shallow breaths. Haru looked like a wide-eyed doe pinned against a tree by a bear that had been chasing its meal for years.

Likewise, Rin was stupefied, and for all intents and purposes became like the rest of the trees on the riverbank. He was a helpless witness to what was unfolding, rooted to the spot, barely breathing. Very unlike those stacks of dead wood, however, was his excited pulse, skipping through his veins.

Makoto's fingers tucked under Haru's chin and tipped his face upwards. Their faces lingered inches from each other, with Makoto's thumb smoothing against Haru's skin. Still frozen, the lump in Haru's throat dipped up and down as he swallowed. Makoto's dark lashes dusted against his cheeks as he closed his eyes, leaned in closer; Haru clenched his eyes and mouth shut and…

Their lips connected in a very soft and chaste kiss, melding over each other in a tender embrace.

Makoto released his captured lips and looked down on Haru with eyes like smoldering sage. Haru looked completely drained of color with his mouth hanging slightly agape. Makoto drew away from Haru, looking empty and disgusted with himself.

"I'm sorry, Haru...I never should I have done that. Gh...I'm so selfish-"

"Makoto, wait."

Haru caught ahold of him by his sleeve. Makoto's body halted on Haru's command, frozen by his spell, his face open and alert.

Haru's mouth was pressed into a firm line, all he could do was stare at the ground.

"...Haru?" Makoto drew closer to him once again.

More silence and neither of them moved an inch. Rin's breathing had all but ceased, he dared not even blink in fear he might miss something.

Haru raised his hands and took his friend's face into them. His blue eyes shivered, they quivered as the emotions behind them savagely fought against each other. His hands released Makoto's face...and dropped down to his collar...

Haru pulled Makoto into him and brought their mouths back together, this time deeper, more indulgent.

Makoto stiffened in surprise, then quickly melted as Haru drew away, then back again for another kiss.

"Ha...H-Haru…" Makoto's voice shuddered between their kisses. Rin watched Makoto's hands shiver as he took Haru's face into his hands.

His voice strangled out, deep and wounded.

"...Haruka…"

Haru's arms hesitantly rose and hovered for a moment beside Makoto. Then they wrapped around his waist and brought him closer, eliminating the space between their bodies.

"Mnnn...nah...Haru…" Makoto huffed, pulling away, and fluttered fleeting kisses over his cheekbones and up his jawline. Makoto buried his face into the crook of his friend's shoulder.

Haru sucked in a breath as Makoto began feathering kisses up the length of his neck, stopping to tease the shell of his ear with his teeth and sultry voice. Haru pressed his lips together as his face bloomed with color, his alabaster fingers dug into the fabric of Makoto's coat by his waist. He squirmed, turning his face away, mortified by whatever Makoto muttered to him.

"Mah...koto…"

Rin got second-hand tremors just from watching…

Wait, why was he _still_ watching this?! Rin whipped away from the scene with his back pressed flat against the pine tree, his whole body burning in a mixture of excitement and mortification.

 _Oh my god...this is wrong, this is wrong on_ so many _levels. What's the_ matter _with me?...wait…what is…?_

Something below his waist pulsated and pressed hard against the inside of his raincoat.

Rin's face flushed with shame and revulsion.

 _No..._ He pressed the back of his hand over his mouth as he suppressed a frustrated scream. He threaded his fingers through his red strands and pulled at the roots as he gritted his pointed teeth.

 _You've gottah be kidding me. This is so sick and wrong, Makoto and Haru are my_ friends _...Why..._ why _is this happening? Stop it!_

He ripped his raincoat apart with a growl and undid his jeans with angry, shaking fingers. He reached into his pants to readjust his stiff member against his leg to make it less conspicuous-

"Ah…"

Heat unfurled in his core and his hand stopped. He was so sensitive, just the simple touch and pressure from grabbing himself had the tip of his member leak wetness into the fabric of his boxers. His knees were going weak.

 _Stop...stop it…_

Rin bit down on his lower lip and shut his lids against the water swimming across his eyes, making his vision blur. Two monstrous feelings wrestled around inside of him. One was his ugly, unsatisfied desire, demanding attention, setting his body on fire, making him squirm. The other was his dignity, his conscience of right and wrong that told him everything he was doing and feeling was twisted and sick. And what made it all so much worse was...he didn't know which feeling to listen to.

His rock-hard member throbbed, pulling him harder in the back-and-forth. Images and sounds surfaced from his chaotic, stormy ocean of thoughts; dark hair and piercing teal eyes, full bow-like lips and olive-tan skin flecked with freckles; sharp collar bones and weathered hands; a path of dark hairs below a navel leading beneath an elastic hem of boxers…

 _Aaahh...Rin._

He heard _his_ voice sigh in his mind, just like he'd heard it a few days ago.

 _Right there...harder…_

"Hnnn…" Rin pressed his hand over his mouth to suppress a mixture of a moan and bile rising in his throat. He pressed his legs together and shifted them back and forth.

What...what was this feeling? His desire was pining for, demanding, the person responsible for those sensations. His desire refused to accept any fantasies of faceless males or females, his mind's eye wanted to gaze only at one person. It was _him_ Rin needed at the helm of his pleasure, steering him down a course unknown, over tumultuous waters, with his broad, weathered hands that fit so well into his own.

"Hck...damn it...damn it all…!"

Rin fled into the woods, not even bothering to look behind him to see if he had been noticed, or if Haru and Makoto were even still there.

* * *

Rin had to get the hell out of was no way he could simply go back to searching for salamanders with those guys like nothing happened. He didn't feel like finding Nagisa or Rei, and he certainly had no interest in meeting back up with Makoto and Haru again.

He sent Makoto a quick text message with some made up excuse to leave immediately. He would have to swing by Haru's house to grab his stuff and hang up his rain coat...On second thought, Rin would give him the coat back the next time he saw him. He had a feeling he was going to be needing it tonight...

Rin felt another hot pulse of want coming from his lower abdomen and his frustration rekindled.

"God...damn it…"

He struggled to get up the steep slope, now turned to slick mud from the rain, that lead up to the road. Once at the top he started running down the dirt road, as if he could escape all his problems if he could just outrun them. His eyes burned against the cold rushing wind. He wanted to believe that was the reason for the wetness leaking from the corners of his eyes.

By the time his boots met the asphalt of the city proper he was walking again, having fizzled out his emotional flame. Rin really hoped that Haru had left his back door unlocked. He just wanted to grab his things and leave.

Twenty minutes later, Rin closed up the back door to Haru's house and set off with his things. But to where?

 _Frickin hell._ Rin let out a ragged breath and tugged a hand through his hair. Now _where the hell am I supposed to go?...I'm_ not _going home._ He closed his eyes and shook his head to get the image of his mom and sister out of his head. He could just see them now, crowding around him and making a fuss: ' _Where have you been?' 'How did you get here!' 'Why are you not at school?' 'What's wrong?' 'What's wrong?' 'Tell us what's wrong!'_

 _No thank you_. Rin groaned. _That's the_ last _thing I need…_ The question went unanswered in his head. Where was he supposed to go now if he couldn't return to Samezuka Academy?...

Rin meandered down the sidewalk without direction or purpose. His gaze was downcast looking at the crude reflections of things shining on the wet pavement, anything to keep him distracted. Thankfully, he didn't encounter anybody as he walked. There came a big puddle in Rin's path and he made to step around it when he paused. There was an irregular reflection hanging upside down on the surface of the dark puddle, with its pagoda style roof and two statues of foo lion guardians protecting the gates.

Rin picked his gaze off the ground and looked up at an old, weathered shrine, puzzled.

"I forgot this place was here…"

Perhaps 'forgot' wasn't exactly the right word. It was more like this place had crept up on him. The wooden structure was soaked dark from the rain and was completely silent. It gave off an aura as if it were inside its own realm where time, noise, and danger could not enter.

Before he could begin to think about if he should, his feet started to carry him up the shallow steps of the shrine. He didn't understand how he could have forgotten about this little shrine, it'd been a favorite spot between him and his friends every time a holiday or challenging task was approaching.

He settled down on a dry spot next to the altar under the eave. He let his head come to rest against the little raised dias. It was only afternoon, but he already felt exhausted. He searched the small clearing, looking for anything to distract himself from the waves of emotions banging against the weak barriers of his composure.

***His eyes fixated on the foo lions, but it was no good. Despite his best effort troublesome memories floated to the surface…

" _Rin!...Rin!" Sosuke called, his voice bouncing off the bare face of the shrine. Rin pressed a hand over his mouth to suppress his laughter. It didn't matter how many times Sosuke tried to get him to come out, he would never surrender his golden hiding spot inside the donations bin in front of the dias. A smile cracked across his face as he enjoyed his own private joke. He could just hear Sosuke becoming more aggravated while he continued his fruitless search._

" _Rin, seriously, it's not funny any more. Where are you…" Sosuke's voice sounded half sulky, half...distraught?_

 _Rin peeked his red eyes through a sliver of the boards just in time to see Sosuke wipe at his eyes and sniffle. He let out a huff and he cast his eyes around once more, looking for his friend...they looked slightly puffy and red. Rin inexplicably felt something compress in his chest._

" _Oi, c'mon, don't cry about it..."_

 _Rin stood up out of the box suddenly and Sosuke yelled, stumbling backwards._

" _R-Rin!"_

" _I didn't go anywhere, you big dummy, I was here the whole time."_

 _Sosuke stood there for a moment with his cerulean eyes wide and his mouth hanging dumbly. Then his dark brows knitted together._

" _...Th-that's not the point!" He finally said. "You broke the rules, we said it was cheating to hide inside the shrine." Sosuke crossed his arms and glared off into the woods. "Now you have to buy me ice cream on the way home."_

" _Oi! Who died and made you game master?! I wasn't hiding in the shrine, I was hiding in the donations box, idiot!"_

" _The donations box is part of the shrine,_ idiot _." Sosuke pulled at the corners of his mouth and stuck his tongue out at Rin in a grotesque gesture._

" _Rrrr...why you!" Rin clamored out of the donations bin but Sosuke had already taken off, his lips twisted in a satisfied grin, his eyes still slightly puffy._

Rin startled as he caught himself being swept away with the memory, even allowing the ghost of a smile to tug at the corner of his mouth. When he looked again, those same foo lions were soaked dark and had creeping moss in their intricate crevices. Many travelers hands had polished down their wood over the years to the point where they were hardly recognizable.

The redhead let out a sigh and rubbed at his eyes. At what point had his life become so complicated and tumultuous? Where had it deviated from innocent fun and games, pure and unadulterated enjoyment, to constant stress and seeking refuge under a shrine during a storm? He'd be quick to answer it had all started when he bought that accursed vitamin powder, but he knew he'd be lying if he settled on that.

Truthfully he knew it had started much earlier. Years ago, back when he first left for Australia and discovered just how big his 'big dream' really was. Part of him died back in Australia, the innocent piece of him that thought he could reach his olympic goals off of pure enthusiasm and friendship. The smiling and laughing Rin, always with bright eyes became somber and brusque, more efficient, not wanting to waste time with anything that wouldn't bring him to the top. He remembered the bitterness that grew in him when he thought he'd wasted his time swimming with others and being part of a team. All that time he'd been holding himself back...or so he thought.

He realized now how foolish it was for him to think those things. Since he'd reconnected with everyone again he'd learned that having friends and swimming for other people could make you stronger than before. But all of that realization didn't change the years of agony he'd gone through before, misinformed and in the dark.

Speaking of friends...

...Rin's wandering thoughts came back to his cell phone. He pulled the device from his coat pocket and looked at his own miserable reflection in the dead, unlit screen. He pressed the home button and the interface lit up, showing him the same notifications he'd seen earlier. The device sat in his hand, feeling heavy like an anchor, weighing him down, preventing him from moving forward. He took a deep breath and punched in the unlock code.

He listened to Nitori's voicemail first.

" _Rin-Senpai?"_ His meek voice sounded frazzled even through the minor distortion of the phone waves. " _Is everything all right? I just got your text message about your family emergency...Momo-kun and I are worried about you. Even Yamazaki-senpai seems worried…"_

Rin's grip tightened around his cell phone.

" _Besides that, Rin-senpai, the RA is concerned too. You didn't sign yourself out tonight before you left, and it doesn't look like a parent or guardian did either._

Rin rolled his eyes skywards, _for crying out loud..._ of _course_ he forgot to sign out. What else could possibly be working against him?

" _They may have already called your mom. I'm not sure, but it wouldn't surprise me if they have."_

None of this was making Rin feel any better.

" _I don't know what happened but I hope everything's okay. I'd call the office a.s.a.p. if I were you, just to check in with them so this doesn't go against your record. Also...Rin-Senpai…"_

Nitori paused, as if he wasn't sure if he should add what he was about to say.

" _I...I know I'm just an underclassman but I like to think of us as f-friends, and, uh...well...just know that you can talk to me about anything that's bothering you, okay?"_

Rin felt his guilt solidify in his chest and weigh him down in the pause that followed those words.

" _Take care, Rin-Senpai."_

Rin didn't think it was possible but he felt even _worse_ than he had before. He sighed and scrolled down to the next voicemail from Momo. He held the phone a few inches away from his face in anticipation…

" _RIN-SENPAAAAAAAIII!"_ Rin bit back a growl in his throat. What kind of person just screams into a phone like that? They had to know that would be going straight into someone's ea-

" _What's going on? I just got your text message-is everything okay? Are you sick? Is_ Gou-san _sick? Is it your mom? I need more information. I won't be able to get any sleep tonight, I'm sick with worry."_ Rin suppressed the urge to roll his eyes as he waited through the pathetic sobbing noises on the other side of the phone.

" _Text me as soon as you can-"_

" _Momo-kun, who are you on the phone with?"_

Rin heard Nitori's voice in the background.

" _Ah! I'm calling Rin-senpai."_

" _I already called him, Momo-kun. You shouldn't be bothering him while he has a fam-"_

Rin couldn't bear to listen to the two of them bicker for the remaining minute and twenty seconds of the voicemail. He got it. He was selfish. He was hurting his friends while leading them to think this was all for a legitimate reason, and what was worse was that he would have to lie to them more as soon as he got back, fabricating some story about his family member's imaginary emergency.

There was still one more message left to listen to. From Sosuke. It was hardly long at all, the info showed that the recording was only 45 seconds long. Rin sat in trepidation staring at it in the list of voicemails with tired eyes, feeling a creeping sense of dread. His finger hovered over the play button, his nerves burning under his skin in indecision. His mouth squashed into a grimace as he debated. Only half an hour ago just the memory of Sosuke's voice was enough to make him…

Rin pressed the play button and pressed the device against his face before he could change his mind.

At first there was nothing, just silence. Then he heard a deep intake of breath.

" _...Rin…"_

He'd only said one word, but the amount of restrained emotion in his voice was palpable. Sosuke's voice saying his name felt like a punch in the gut, making Rin grit his teeth.

" _Come back to Samezuka. We need to settle this properly. Nothing will get resolved if we both run away from the issue...see you."_

 _You jerk..._ A fire burned in Rin's belly, his vision blurred with water. _Don't make it sound like I haven't been trying to address this!_ He glared at his cellphone's screen, resisting the urge to whip the damn thing across the shrine when all of a sudden it buzzed with an incoming text message.

 _New text message from Sosuke Y._

Rin felt his chest muscles constrict. His fingers reacted automatically, not even giving his overloaded mind time to overthink. He tapped on the message and it brought him back to their text history. The text was very simple, but it spoke volumes.

 _Tell me where you are. I need to know you're okay._

Rin blinked his eyes in confusion. A little ellipsis appeared under the message and Rin held his breath.

 _Rin, please…_

Unable to take any more, Rin turned off his phone and viciously shoved it into his backpack. Rin's vindictive side should have been dancing over the fact that Sosuke was in pain. _Good_ , he would normally think _, let that idiot have a little taste of his own medicine_. Sosuke deserved to go through the exact same worry Rin went through thinking about him. So why was Rin suffering at the idea of Sosuke in pain?

Suddenly exhausted, Rin shut his eyes against the rain dancing in his vision. He leaned against the small dias and tried to focus on only the sound of the shower coming down, ferociously fighting off images of a hurt cerulean face.

…

"...ing you, get back here. I really don't condone this…"

Voices floated to Rin's hazy consciousness in the murky void of his sleep. His frazzled mind wasn't sure if the voices were real, or a fragment of his dreams. He lingered in his dreamy state, waiting for the voices to drown out, so he could return to sleep. He was so exhausted…

There was a soft whining noise.

"What's wrong with you, Rei-chan?"

"It isn't safe, Nagisa-kun. You never truly know how desperate people are. She could be dangerous."

Nagisa? Rei? Rin's brow furrowed as he reluctantly picked his consciousness out of the soft, insulating shroud of sleep.

"Don't say things like that, Rei-chan! What if it were you that were poor and hungry?" Rin could just hear the righteous petulance in Nagisa's voice. "Wouldn't you want someone to help you? Stop stigmatizing homeless people as being dangerous…"

Homeless? What was he talking about?

The blonde's voice shifted to sweet as honey, and was suddenly very close to him. "Excuse me, ma'am…"

Rin lifted his scowling face.

"Who're you calling ma'am?"

Nagisa stumbled backwards, surprised, and dropped the granola bar he'd been holding. He and Rei were still wearing their raincoats and galoshes from earlier, only now the rain was coming down much harder. The heavy gloom clinging to the trees suggested to Rin that it was early evening. Just how long had he been asleep?

"Dwah! Wait a second, this isn't a hobo, it's Rin-chan!"

Rin made a choking noise in the back of his throat.

"Hobo?" Did he really look that destitute?

"Rin-san, is that you?" Rei came closer to them. "What on earth are you doing here sleeping at the shrine?"

Rin's words stuck to his tongue like sandpaper. He tore his gaze away from them and glared at the road behind them.

"...Shouldn't you be heading back to your house or your school?" Nagisa's blonde brows wrinkled upwards, his voice softening. "...don't you have any where to go, Rin-chan?"

"Of course I do, don't be ridiculous." Rin stood, doing his best to avoid looking either of them in the eye. "I was on my way home and I just got tired, that's all. I didn't mean to fall asleep here, it was just an accident." He swiftly slipped passed them and started heading towards the road. "See you around."

"W-wait, Rin-chan!"

Nagisa called after him, something in his tone made Rin linger and look back.

"Eeeehh…" The blonde's expression clearly showed he hadn't expected his friend to stop. It quickly melted to his signature nonchalant smile and he scratched the back of his head. "Uuuhh...I was just wondering...do you uhm...have plans tonight?"

Rin's eyebrows jumped up.

"To...night? That's...I-"

"-Would you wanna sleep over?" Nagisa blurted all at once, surprising both Rei and himself.

"Nagisa-kun, what about-"

"Rei-chan…" The blonde turned and connected a meaningful stare with his best friend, their amethyst and peony eyes both quivering as if they were relaying some sort of telepathic message.

"Ah yes," Rei smiled and continued the dialogue as if he hadn't skipped a beat. Rin noticed belatedly that he was holding a small plastic cage with rotting leaves and a salamander in it. "I forgot I have to go home and review the samples we collected today. Rin-san," He dipped his head in a polite nod. "It was nice to see you again."

"Uhhh...sure…" Rin watched the smiling butterfly swimmer pass him by with an arched, crimson brow.

 _What the hell was that all about?_

"I was thinking that we haven't hung out in such a long time," Nagisa's voice brought Rin's attention back to the front. "I was totally gonna ask you earlier but then you ended up leaving. Soooo...whadda ya say?"

Nagisa beamed a smile up at Rin that made it nearly impossible to decline.

"I mean, unless you have other plans…?"

* * *

****"There sure was a lot that you missed out on while you were abroad!"

Rin leaned his cheek into his fist and passively watched Nagisa with half lidded eyes bouncing all around his room. Outside, the rain had intensified, incessantly tapping against the black glass and slithering down like angry little snakes. His red orbs twitched back and forth, up and down, as the blonde zipped from picture, to trophy, to yearbook, to saved art projects. Rin drummed his fingers against the low sitting table, letting his impatience slip through his glamour of indifference.

He bit back his intemperance, not wanting to be rude, and instead took a sip of the hot green tea Nagisa prepared for him, accepting the warmth it brought into his bones. Rin had shed his stifling raincoat and put on some warmer, more comfortable sweats. Even though he felt morbidly guilty for indulging in Nagisa's hospitality, Rin couldn't deny that sitting in his brightly lit room was infinitely better than huddling under some broken down shrine.

Rin supposed he should have been happy to have the distraction, having Nagisa's insesent chipper voice fill every instance of silence, and shoving all that stimulus into his face, to help him not think about his current dilemma. But for some reason, he couldn't get rid of a terrible hollowness haunting his chest, making him feel like a husk.

Nagisa's voice pierced through his troubling thoughts and arrested his attention.

"So what did you want to do first tonight, Rin-chan?"

He blinked.

"Do?"

"Mmm! We could tell scary ghost stories, watch sci-fi movies, make some hot chocolate Oooh! Or we could prank call someone."

"Ng…" He sighed. He wasn't in the mood for this. "Nagisa…"

"Aaaaahh, it's been so long since I've had a _real_ sleepover where I can do all the things _guys_ are supposed to do at sleepovers. Rei-chan never wants to-"

"Nagisa…"

His friend seemed to hear the shift in his tone this time and sat down.

"Rin-chan? What's up?"

The redhead took in a steady breath and let it out quietly.

"Nothing really. I was just wondering...when I came back from Australia...would you say I was," He clenched at his cup and stared at his own reflection on the surface. "...different at all?"

Nagisa tilted his head to the side.

"What do you mean?"

Rin felt his anxiety swirling like a vortex inside him, giving him a slight sense of vertigo. _What_ do _I mean?_ He didn't even understand what had made him ask the question to begin with.

"You know: like, was I mostly the same as before or...was it like I was an entirely different person?"

"Hnn...well." The blonde brought a crooked finger to his chin in a thoughtful pause. "I wouldn't say by the way that you looked, necessarily, but I do remember thinking you definitely had changed very much as a person."

For some reason that answer made his stomach sink.

"Is that so…"

"Why, Rin-chan?"

"...forget it. It's nothing."

A pregnant pause overcame them that was very uncharacteristic of Nagisa's regular company.

"Why were you sleeping at the shrine earlier today?"

The question ran through Rin's center like a lance.

He picked up his tea to hide his face behind his cup.

"I already told you, I was on my way home and just got tired, that's all."

"Rin-chan…"

The redheaded captain had a hard time swallowing his drink around the growing lump of guilt in his throat. He set his cup back down on the wood, perhaps a little too forcefully.

"I told you, it's nothing."

More silence followed. Rin was just wondering how he should thank Nagisa for the invite and politely excuse himself when the blonde said something he hadn't expected.

"I ran away from home once too, Rin-chan."

Crimsons disks flew up to Nagisa's face, his red brows jumping up in shock.

"...you have?"

Nagisa turned his gaze out the blackened windows with a rueful smile.

"I used to think I could just run away from my problems, that'd they would just go away if I ignored them. But I realized by doing that I wasn't hurting just myself, I was hurting my friends too." Nagisa's pale fingers gripped at the fabric of his pants.

"I made everyone worry about me instead of taking responsibility and facing my problems head on. It initially may seem easier to run away or ignore a problem, but it actually makes things more difficult." Nagisa's eyes creased from a warm smile that contradicted his somber words.

Rin made a noise in the back of his throat.

"Nagisa...you don't think I know that?" His fingers picked at the rough texture of his tea mug. "You're not saying anything I haven't thought of a thousand times already."

"So you did run away then." Rin's mouth wrinkled at the sound of satisfied discovery in Nagisa's tone.

"Yeah, I did. You happy now, sherlock?" Rin regretted the words as soon as he heard the hurt in his friend's voice.

"Of course I'm not. I know what it's like to get to that point and I wouldn't wish it on anyone. Especially you, Rin-chan."

"Well…" He shrugged. "Now you know."

"But why did you run away?"

"That's…" He bit down on his lower lip as images from the previous night exploded behind his eyes like firecrackers. "I don't really wanna talk about it."

A sad chuckle escaped Nagisa's lips, confusing the hell out of Rin.

"Now I understand why my friends were so irritated before."

Rin connected a flat glare with Nagisa's glittering tourmaline eyes.

"What's that?"

"Rin-chan, it's a bit rude to indulge in someone's hospitality and not tell them why you need to, don't you think?"

The little vixen sent a sneaky blow of guilt right to Rin's ribs, making him produce a strangled noise.

"Oi, aren't you the one who _invited_ me here?" Rin quipped back, making Nagisa produce a sheepish grin. Rin let out a huff of hot air. He knew he was just being bratty and petulant. Nagisa deserved to know what his reasons were for staying just like Haru deserved to know.

"...I guess you have a point though. Fine then...do you remember meeting my new teammate, Sosuke?"

"Nnnn...I think so? I remember seeing him with you once before at coach Sasabe's swim club, but that was quite a while ago now. You and So-chan are really close childhood friends, right?"

Rin's eyebrow twitched

"So-chan…? Ugh, whatever. Anyway...I...I used to think we were close friends, but…" Rin studied the fake patterns in the cheap wood of the table. "Now I'm thinking maybe I actually don't know him any better than I know my most casual classmates."

"So you running away has something to do with So-chan?"

"Yeah." Rin raked his fingers through his hair, threading it back into a low ponytail and tied it there with a band he had in his pocket. It felt better to keep his nervous hands busy with something. "I just can't be around him right now."

"Hnnnn...so there's trouble between Rin-chan and his best friend too...ooh! That reminds me!"

Nagisa leaned in so suddenly Rin drew back as if a feisty animal had tried to snap at him.

"Spill the beans, Rin-chan! It's time for you to repay my hospitality by telling me everything you know!"

"What are you going on about all of a sudden?"

"Huu huu huu, don't try to play coy with me. You know what I'm talking about." Nagisa narrowed his eyes. "I mean what happened with Mako and Haru-chan in the woods today. I know you know something."

Rin felt his blood freeze with dread. How on earth could he begin to explain what he'd witnessed?

"I'm sure you noticed it earlier today too, Rin-chan...they've both been so unfriendly towards each other for the longest time. But then it was so strange! I guess you wouldn't know this since you left, but when they came back they were totally all better...and Haru-chan was even _smiling_. It should have made me happy but I was just creeped out! You were with them while hunting, so what happened?"

Two ends suddenly clicked together in Rin's mind, like two wires meeting in a shower of sparks, and simultaneously his brows drew together in an angry v.

"Wait a second...you knew something was going to happen today in the woods, that's why you took off with Rei before any of us could argue about it earlier."

"Sorry, Rin-chan." Nagisa gave him a small smile that essentially said 'I'm not really all that sorry.'

"Sorry my ass. Don't pretend like you feel bad for what you did."

"So something did happen then? Tell me, tell me! Gimme the deets, Rin-chan."

"Oi, knock it off." Rin growled and shook off Nagisa's blonde head snuggling against his shoulder.

"Look…" Bile rose to the back of Rin's throat and he clamped it shut, swallowing it back down. "I'm sorry to disappoint you but I legitimately didn't see anything. At one point we all got separated while looking for a stream and I didn't get a chance to meet back up with them before I had to leave. Whatever happened between them I wasn't there to see it." Rin was unable to look Nagisa in the eye. "Your guess is as good as mine…"

"Uuuuuuuggggh no waaaaahaaay." Nagisa rolled around on the carpet. "You can't be serious! Here I was thinking I was finally going to get some answers and now _nothing_. I was so _careful_ with my planning, where did I go wrooooonnnggguu?"

The blonde composed himself, crossing his arms with a sigh.

"Well, I guess that's just it then. There's no other way to find out other than asking them directly." His lips pursed in a pout. "I prefer more _subtle_ methods though."

"Don't you mean 'sneaky'?"

"I like to think of it as detective work. Like the spies in the James Bond movies!" Nagisa held up his hand in the shape of a pistol and dropped his voice. " _The name is Bond. James Bond_."

Rin felt a shiver go down his spine.

"...you're too good at doing that."

"Say, come to think of it, don't you think maybe it would be a good idea for you to get some advice from Mako-chan about all this?"

Rin drew back like he'd been struck. There was no way Nagisa could have known just how on-point his suggestion was, but the statement was still uncanny.

"What do mean?"

"Well, I'm not really sure what's going on with you and So-chan, and I don't really know what started it between Mako and Haru-chan either. But in general it seems like your problems are similar. You guys are both in an argument with your best friends so maybe Mako-"

"I don't think that's a good idea." Rin desperately wanted to murder this discussion. Shoot it down out of the sky and burry it deep in the mud.

"Oh...well, why not?"

Rin held out his hand as his brow furrowed, exasperated, searching for something to say.

"Just what exactly am I supposed to ask him?"

 _Hey Makoto, I happened to notice you making out with Haru earlier up against a tree. Yeah, I watched you, that's weird, right? Anyway, you think you can give me any pointers about having romantic feelings for your best friend? Thanks a bunch, nice catching up with you._

He pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Our situations are more than likely too different for it to even be relevant to me. Besides, I already know what I have to do...I don't need advice."

"Then...if you already know what you're supposed to do...then what are you doing here?"

Rin picked his head up, eyes alight and ready to fight but the righteousness he found in Nagisa's unwavering peony stare beat him down. He let out a defeated breath.

"...I don't know."

Nagisa glanced over at the clock on his night stand.

"It's only 6:30. My parents haven't even started making dinner yet...If you want I could have my dad drive you back to your school?"

The words sunk to the bottom of Rin's gut like a stuffed body bag, still wriggling and writhing, giving him a sinking sense of dread. Rin had said it himself. He knew what he had to do...what was the reason for putting it off?

He swallowed.

"...Yeah. If you don't mind, let's do that."

A small smile warmed Nagisa's face.

"That's the spirit, Rin-chan. Fight!"

* * *

 **Aaaaaayyyy, happy new year! Posting this on the 1st! So you're probably all wondering this by now: 'when the hell does this story actually take place in the show's timeline?' Well you can rest assured, because I've thought about it very long and hard and I've decided**

 **I** _ **really**_ **don't fucking care.**

 **I mean obviously, I respect major plot points and character traits that appeared in the anime, but one of the great things about writing fanfiction is not everything has to go the same way (or happen in the same order) as it did in the series. Honestly, I've been writing this story the way I've been wanting to, and for me, this is a story about how Rin and Sosuke fall in love with each other first (everything else takes a second-seat). Since that doesn't happen in the official series the story that gets told will be slightly different, kind of like an alternate universe sort of thing :)**

 **Also, I know I promised some juicy things happening between Rin and Sosuke this chapter but I did that thing where I write way too much and the chapter is a thousand miles long, so I had to break up what I have here. Trust me, I've got more coming, I'm really going to try and have next chapter done before I go back for spring semester (I'm gonna start substitute teaching soon, which should help me with my education major so wish me luck!).**

 **Right, welp, that's all I have to say about that for now. I hope you enjoyed and will continue to enjoy this story.**

 **+=+=+=Random short:=+=+=+**

Rin looked at his friends all dressed in their different colored raincoats and he scowled.

"Nnnn? What's wrong Rin-chan?"

"Y'all be lookin' like frickin Teletubbies, that's what!"

A collective gasp ran through their group.

"Rin!" Makoto looked horrified.

"Rin-san, you don't mean that!"

"Yeah, I do."

Nagisa's cheeks pouted outwards.

"Well if we're all teletubbies then you're one too, since you're wearing a red raincoat!"

"Oi! Don't lump me in with you guys, I didn't choose to wear this ridiculous thing!"

Rei pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose as he read some text on his smartphone.

"According to my research, there are four main teletubbies: they're red, purple, green and yellow."

"Waaah! That's right, so I'd be-!"

"Laa-Laa's the yellow one, Nagisa…"

They all turned to Haru with bewildered expressions. He quickly looked away.

"Not that...I would know, or anything."

Nagisa snickered.

"So then Mako-chan would be...what's the green one's name?"

"Dipsy."

"D-Dipsy?!"

Makoto's face burned bright pink as his friends all sputtered at his stupid name.

"Hey, c'mon guys, knock it off!"

"Calm down, Dipsy. Don't get your dipstick all bent out'uh shape."

Makoto's dark expression worsened at Nagisa's teasing. Rin slapped a hand over his mouth to quash his laughter in his throat.

Makoto planted his hands on his hips.

"Well all right then, what's Rin's stupid name?"

"Po."

"Oh!? Po! Ahahahahahahaha!" Makoto fake laughed, though it was obvious he was just mad. "What kinda dumb name is that! Po? More like HOE, am I right?"

No one laughed.

"...Makoto, seriously, you need to just accept the fact you have a stupid name."

Rei made a noise in the back of his throat and crammed his phone back in his pocket.

"W-well then, I think we should be on our way then, don't you think?"

"Wait, didn't you say there was a purple one too?"

"Wha?-Oh, y-yeah, I did," He laughed nervously. "But, he's like, not a _main_ character, really, he's like just uh-uh, side character-"

"What's his name?"

"I'm telling you, it's _nothing_ , please just let it go-"

Before Rei could turn away Nagisa grabbed ahold of him and held him in place while Makoto reached for his pockets.

Rei squirmed wildly, trying to escape.

"Stop it! Let me go!"

Makoto yanked his phone out.

"Got it!"

Rei's face crumpled.

"Please no, I'm begging you!"

Makoto loaded the page and Rei watched in horror as the humor spread across his face.

"Oh my god, its name's TINKY WINKY!"

The quiet air surrounding Haru's house shattered as everyone (besides Rei) threw their heads back and guffawed, hugging their sides and rolling on the ground.

Rei pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose trying to hide the redness spreading across his face.

"I don't see what's so funny! Tinky Winky is a very respectable name!"

"Oh my god, I'm gonna throw up…" Nagisa recovered from his laughter, but then quickly sputtered and started laughing all over again. "Pfffftt...you can't be serious, Tinky Winky…!?"

"Oi! Oi T-!" Rin couldn't even get the word out without laughing.

"Oi T-tinky Winky!"

Rei regarded his friend with a flat stare.

"Please just spare me..."

"What size's your winky? Is it...tinky sized?!"

Rei bristled and adjusted his glasses once again.

"I would appreciate it if you kept your _small dick jokes_ to yourself, Rin-san! And it's not _tinky sized_ , whatever the hell that means! It's a perfectly _normal_ size!"

"Ooooohhhh…" Makoto wiped a tear from the corner of his eye. "It's too bad there's not a blue teletubbie. I'd like to know what Haru's stupid name would be."

"Wait!" Nagisa's pink orbs shivered as they furiously read over the text on the wikipedia page. "...It says there's a blue vacuum thing that lives in their weird house and just eats shit they drop on the floor!"

"What the-They fucking _live_ together?!"

"Well, what's its name?"

"It's name…" Haru called their attention back to his front porch, where he'd been standing this entire time. " _My_ name…" He stared nobly into the setting sun. "...Is Noo-Noo…"

"So if I pulled down my pants and dropped a hot load onto the ground would you for serious eat it?"

Nagisa jolted as Haru ripped his gaze away from the heavens and stabbed a glare straight through him.

"Don't be a disgusting _swine_ , Nagisa!...Noo-Nooes only eat tubbycustard or tubbytoast."

-Fin-

((I think there must be something seriously wrong with me))


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